Athirst Ember
by VidGmr1996
Summary: A (remake of my) coming-of-age story of a jackal who went thru some things, and they weren't all good. All in a 1/2 year's work (writing the story). Prolly the longest story I've ever posted here. Keep it REAL in your reviews!
1. PROLOGUE

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 **:::Disclaimer: The Sonic series and all that jazz are owned by SEGA. :::**

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Doctor Eggman has been standing halfway up, hands cocked on the handles of his comfy chair for the past few minutes, in anticipation of what's laid out before him on the computer screen. This is much like watching pay-per-view, except he is both the sole audience and mastermind behind it all. Once in a while, he taps a key to change the cameras outputted through several of his badniks.

A small group of G.U.N. agents had already faced the worst of it, skirting through and destroying a dozen Crabmeats, and nearly facing death from a huge stretch of weakened earth.

 _Click._ Eggman switches from the cam of a fallen Rhinobot to what he assumes to be a Leon, based on the strange angle. A pellet of energy spat out from the bottom of the screen confirms this, to which one of the agents takes notice and leaps to the side, firing his ammunition of energy blasts. The camera jolts and a cloud of dirt covers its vision—it saunters through the air as a rocket propeller blasts through his speakers, nearly colliding face-first into two of them. It prepares to curve itself back towards—

 **LEON..259901-GHZ.C1 SIGNAL LOST.**

 _Click._

Eggman's teeth are clamped down on each other so hard one can argue it'll be nigh impenetrable to break through them as his eyes are ever so glued to the screen.

The current point-of-view shows something sailing out of the sands and over the striped grass, making the agents huddle on the ground. The badnik cam seems to fall off of its method of transportation—a growling sandworm, to which it had fallen into the sea of sand on the other side, causing quite a quake.

Between the blades of grass, the agents nod to each other in confirmation and proceed to storm off, nearly tripping over them themselves as a column of energy converts their kinetic energy into static.

Eggman finally heaves a hearty laughter. "Oh ho ho ho ho!"

 _Click._

Through another Buzzer cam—

" _Yes_ , finally!" he shouts, brandishing enthusiastic fists high into the air. "Oh ho ho," he brings his hands down on either end of the keyboard, the console bobbling slightly from the abrasive motion. He wanted to see the results in full effect, witnessing the meddlesome group all tangled up with each other within the confines of a Klagen as its jellyfish-like body floats off.

The rotund scientist yanks an Egg sandwich off a nearby plate, gouging the centermost part with a hearty bite. "More to add to my captor collection. A new opposition thought they could chew a hole into my base's defenses...and it has only been a week—"

A glimpse of crimson pulses through the room.

A hand—a wet one—which had crept upon Eggman's shoulder, twirls his port-bellied self around to face a being half his size, causing a half-eaten Egg sandwich to be wrenched out of his hands, its airborne journey ending in an anticlimactic _splat_ on the recently-sanitized floor. Then, that same gloved hand coils its fingers around his collar and pulls him close to his masked face, his other hand holding a twitching, crimson carcass of cubes. Eggman can smell the liquid dripping off of him, with its strangely-sweet odor. Underneath that one-eyed visor can the creature hear his own, low-pitched growling paired up with heavy breaths, causing his chest to heave in and out, in an attempt to control these layers of anger as to not further the rage swelling up inside him.

"Wha...how did you escape from your resting tank?! And what is the meaning of this, Infinite?!...I command you to stop this at once!" Eggman shouts a meaty, angered scream at the masked being. His single eye stares into the scientist's own glassed pair, and a silent duel of the Doctor's anger and the dwelling rubic energy of the creature seemed to reach a stalemate. After a long minute had went by did Infinite loosen his grip on the scientist, letting his gruesome power submit back into nothingness.

"My apologizes, sir. I've must have taken your word out of context," he says with his a deep voice, readjusting the doctor's skewered collar back in place before Eggman swats his hand off him, curling his fingers around the masked one's damp wrist.

"Should I have taken _you_ out of context? You should be thankful for what I've given you!" he states loudly, with every word emphasized with the strangling of Infinite's cuffed wrist. "I've revitalized you to a height many others wished to have obtained!"

For a second, he was afraid of the doctor, in spite of his cognizance of the man's meek strength compared to his. And still, the creature compliantly hears his words. He didn't mean to do what he did moments before. A single word caused him to act so recklessly, even with all this power. He feels ashamed to be so worked up over that. It was his instinctive high getting the better of him once again, the first time in a long while since his defeat...

The mustached dictator frees Infinite's wrist and tidies himself back to a presentable appearance, observing his silent henchman as his wings of facial hair banked side to side for a bit.

The creature's golden eye and clawed fingers take a gander at the mess.

"Commander, let me clean up—"

"—No! Cubot!"

The cubed, metal servant hovers to his master. He stops with his head pitched up to his creator, lanky arms leaving his hands to lay limp over each other.

"Yes, Master Eggman?"

The obese man zings an index finger straight to the collapsed bundle of food on the floor.

"You know what to do..."

Cubot just looks at it.

"...Eat it—?"

A sounding _slap_ almost knocks Cubot's head off its neck socket, the strike coming out so instantly it was like the doctor was wholly expecting a nonsensical response.

"You idiot! Clean it up! Chop-chop!" He claps his hands.

"Right away sir!" Cubot salutes before sailing off on his rectangular hoverbottom, looking to find a mop of sorts.

The scientist's gaze turns back to Infinite.

"I shouldn't waste your time with such mundane tasks such as cleaning up messes on the floor. Instead, why don't you train some of that anger you so distastefully streaked onto me, and unleash it on our dearest frenemy Sonic?"

"...Sonic? Why not The Shadow?" Infinite ponders.

"'The Shadow?' What...oh, _Shadow_?! Well, aside from that pincushion putting a stamp on one of my plans, his effects on my soon-to-be-global empire was at best partial. The real target we should be focusing on is Sonic. He's something else...a real pain, our true source of opposition. You understand, don't you? He makes even the strongest band of sandworms look like mere _earthworms_ compared to him! I mean, have you ever had that feeling of being atop of the world, where the sky was your only limit, only to have that one person destroy everything you obtained, and strip you of your former glory?!" Eggman profoundly hoists his hand in to the air with a mighty grip.

"Yes," Infinite takes a step forward, his moist glove scrunches in his taut fist.

"Oh, right..." Eggman feels a bit foolish to forget such a turn of events that happened not-so-long ago. "But!" he exclaims, "Luckily for us, not only will I pack the guns for our next encounter...we have you," he turns around, finger aptly pointing straight at his lackey.

"There's a reason why you are called Infinite..." Eggman rises from his chair. He slowly walks around his henchman with an arm folded behind his back. "Your power is en masse, something that can cause my data scanners to overload! I expect the both of us to stop Sonic right then and there once we get to the City by twilight." The Doctor shifts himself back to the direction of his computer, tapping in a command to review the manufacturing progress of his machines.

"Onceafter all of my troops are prepared, we will proceed to take control of the City, with no remorse! In due time, that blasted hedgehog will wedge himself in the middle of our 'little' ambush, oh believe me on that. He _always_ does...and when it happens, he will realize that this time, it will be the greatest mistake of his life. Anyways, in the meantime, why don't you help yourself to the VR training? After all, someone like you has to make sure the Sky is _beyond_ the limit, and therefore, you alone can reach the Sun" he states, gesturing a hand in the air.

Infinite feels his pride thriving everytime the Doctor praises him. One might even see the amusement in his eye underneath that thick mask.

"I can, Commander. I will" he lightly nods to Eggman before trailing off, heading towards the exit several yards away.

Something comes over Infinite as he stops.

"Commander Eggman..."

"Yes, Infinite?"

"My squad...will they be given a second chance?" he gives his leader a curious eye.

Eggman had noticed the minuscule bits of softness thinly veiled underneath a layer of fortitude at that moment. This causes him to think about the question for a time.

"Only time will tell, my friend." he simply retorts.

The dreadlocked creature delivers a small nod and shows himself out, slowly treading his floating form past the dozens of containment chambers around him on either side of the pathway.

As he leisurely approaches the containment doors, he ponders back to a simpler time, walking through the slums of town.

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 **This is a redo of my previous story.**

 **All I'll say is...reviews will help you evolve.**

 **Trivia: The theme I heard while making Eggman's dialogue (NOTE: All links posted in this story are from YouTube): /watch?v=ywyRI75T_Iw**

 **Other trivia: Yes, I made up words in this story, and they're in thru-out. Deal with it**


	2. ZERO

If a foreigner had first laid eyes on the community, they wouldn't be able to tell the difference, probably not even through a double-take, nor the small stretch of hill that tried to enforce the distinguishing halves. Both the rich and poor alike took residence in elaborate homes that resembled huts. The decorations on their houses on both ends of the financial spectrum looked identical, except the rich's houses poised glimmers of sapphire, while the poor had aquamarine. The smells of their plum and fig-laden cuisines respectively should probably indicate this further. Nonetheless, every house had at least an elderly living amongst her descendants, allowing their families to prosper as their faces withheld strange masks, some more bizarrely decorated or uniquely designed than others. Their purpose appeared to be ambiguous, with a random lot of them wearing them during mundane things such as chatting amongst their canine selves, to flossing their thick lawns with a grass brush. Sometimes you might see an occasional mask removal, but their unveiling turns out to be not much at all; maybe a spot on their fur, but nothing worrisome.

If you were an individual like Little Boy, you would know that what you were born with held some merit. Unfortunately, things have appeared to lean towards the side of adversity, because of a trait he carried since birth, which had given his family bad stigma.

The 'scar' on his face. An obvious attribute that lent itself from the center of his forehead streaking through his right eye, tapering off the side of it, right above his white muzzle. It was told to be a double-edged sword—a sign of both bad luck and weakness, harsh truths many a jackal would deny time and time again, until they submit to their valid influence. He also had 'twosome-lens', or what he later learned to be known as 'heterochromia', which was said to pave the way for his family towards a life of great, expansive luck. In fact, this particular oddity nullified any malignant traits one may have. The only issue was that this was a rare occurrence, having someone holding these two distinct traits, the first of its kind of which had happened. When Little Boy was just a pup, his parents would argue on which of the traits would overpower the other. They needed luck on their side; desperately, in fact. His family was niggling within the poverty side of town, and only had just enough brass rings to live by and to give to the male elderlies living in the wheathside to confirm any omens. Still, all their efforts to earn a measly ring was for naught, as even the wise made a fuss of confusion over the jackal's double-inheritance.

By this juncture, this was where his parents finally decided a name for their boy. He carried both the benign and malign, and neither side appear to cause any effect, resulting in an impasse. Because of this, he was titled 'Zero.'

As he grew up and was old enough to walk and talk, Zero eavesdropped on his parents, who were discussing the omens he'd gotten, occasionally with his grandmother. The stories of luck intrigued him; sounded something good. Even as a little child, Zero would occasionally be able to decipher the privileges the slums got compared to the wealthier neighborhoods. The families around where he resided had oatmeal with strange consistency and a weird aftertaste, while he could only wonder what the sapphires ate, what with the delicious, fruity scent pleasing his nostrils. Zero wanted to prove that he was a vessel for luck, not only for them, but even for a source of amusement. The little Zero tried to find a triple-striped blade of grass, and everywhere he went it was nowhere to be found. He sung a howl into the cloudy skies to reap the thunderous terror and show the glistening light to water-drunken plants, but the cinereal clouds stayed stagnant in the air, nonsubmissive to any charm he assumed he had. It was slowly realized that one of the sides had come to fruition; it definitely wasn't the work of his twosome-lens.

Zero tried his hand on proving that he wasn't some weak jackal amongst the black-and-white canines when he grew older, dabbling in the practices of sword fighting. The old, masked patriarchs were at first hesitant, but his parents pleaded for them to allow this. There was a dash of hope that his luck was hidden in combat. He could fight his way up through the ranks, tear through opponents with ease during the annual grand tournaments, and stand tall above even the mightiest warrior in the village. Maybe even become a royal guardian for his people! Zero would occasionally sit back and watch swordfighters go at it in the slums. His parents forbid him from going up to the guards when he was younger, but it wasn't long before he went against their wishes and approached them anyway, just to see how they were like. Their faces never budged, absolutely apathetic. It was almost comedic that a snap, a funny face, or even a slight tap on the head never seemed to faze them. But Zero knew it would be absolutely foolish to mess with the weapons they were holding. They carried their own swords, which from the outside world looks rather unique. The shapes of their blades and handles simultaneously appeared unusual but practical. Each one had a sword as their sole weapon, as even though they looked under-armed, these guards were trained to use their bodies and sword to the fullest, emphasizing on quality over quantity in terms of being ready to face anything that posed a threat to the village. He wished to see how they would fight, but any form of fighting that pertained to entertainment was seen as detrimental to their duties as guardians, so they were barred from doing so. Otherwise, their privileges to protect and serve would be revoked by the patriarchs. This disappointed Zero, but he still sought to aspire becoming a skilled fighter of some sort.

He also read stories of big-scale warriors in their heyday from generations ago, every so often reading them to himself, even trying to mimic their moves shown in the sewn fabric. Personally, Zero had an ambition to face a dark deity not many came back sane from once he was at the peak of his fighting ability—The Shadow. This was something rummaging about in his head when he read up on how his favorite fable fighter died trying to fight the beast when it became too big for its own good, drunken by its overabundance on darkness. To his merit, the deceased battler was able to suppress The Shadow to the point its shape was the size of a baby striped grass blade. It had been told that it was steadily regaining influence once more. Despite this, Zero wanted to finish the job his hero tried to accomplish. This, in turn, will truly show that he was naturally capable of spreading his goodwill all over the village.

But sadly, he was always the one that collapsed ajar, head over heels within the grandfighting hut, wondering what had made the battle end so fast. Zero had potential, at least he believed in this notion, but others, including the patriarchs, denied this twinkle of inner talent. It crushed him that one of his favorite pasttimes and biggest dreams was diminished by every loss. There were certain instances where Zero was actually getting the upper hand in the heat of battle, but then things always transpired, usually for the worse. Every single one of the jackal's losses made his mind heavy with doubt. This created another factor to his shortcomings in battle, which was that Zero could never suppress his abundance of thinking, doubting himself based on what others had told him.

 _You can't do this._ Am I in the right stance? Why is he taller than me? _Just drop the sword and raise your hands._ Do I look into his eyes while we fight? _What are you doing?_ Are the elderies downplaying me on purpose? _The elderies are right; you're a clueless fighter._ Why is he stronger than me? _This is a waste of time. What a lost cause._ Are my parents proud that I at least _try_? _Good luck will never be on your side._ How do I position my legs? _They want you to lose._ Why is he better than me? _You'd pick a better fight with the grass. You are not worthy to fight._ How do I _start? You don't._

Thereafter, he was sitting on his bottom, in awe of the victory in plain sight snatched from his fingertips. With every spiraling step into the descent of predestined ungreatness, a growing pain was starting to develop. It hadn't really affected him at this point, but when it was triggered, he felt the faint vessel of aches churn through his right arm into his head. Regardless, he was aimless in his pleads to plant the seeds of good will.

What was he supposed to do about his 'scar', shave it off? He went about and tried this by embezzling his family's week's worth of rings to let one of the 'sapphires' use their strange, 'electronic trimmer' to flay the fur off his face. It was a strange, quick process, what with that loud humming noise assaulting his ears for a few seconds when it happened. Of course, it was a given that his parents would make him floss every strand of striped blades on their lawn a hundred strokes each; it was a no-brainer that they would put two and two together to see where their money went. It was circumstances _outside_ of that Zero was curious of. How can being bare naked of bad luck work for himself and the town at hand? Well, his influences, good or bad, were mute. There wasn't a hint of a miracle or a calling to a means of end-all. Dreadfully, he waited for those the newborn hairs on his face, carrying that grayish sheen, to return, which they did; some say whiter than even before, and that meant _worse_ things could happen to his family!

Oh, did he felt so foolish to attempt to ward off the bad omen, but Zero's naivety made his parents start to show their resentment towards him. The air stung of the good life jettisoned, affecting others. He felt his biggest mistake was drinking the water from the sacred stream, without using a bucket to scoop with, instead using his hands. About a short while after, the poor side was stricken with tainted water. The rich side nary a made an attempt to provide them with their liquid goods, and in turn it was too late when they too caught the murkiness on their end. Zero had talked to several other spouses who wanted to side with hm and give advice to confront his shortcomings, but the jackal was unaware of the fact that the various couples became heartbroken til after the third instance. One time he waved at an elderly with both hands, and she fell ill the day after! He made various folk tainted with shamefulness, and many growing their own personal vendettas against him. They stood their distances from the young canine, as if he was the most disgusting sight they ever saw. Zero did try to talk to others around his age, but they talked through their fists and feet, buckling him down into a fetal-positioned dreck caught in the bundle of tall grass, where no one saw him beaten. Soon, the grand council named him to be a strong influence of weakness, and he was ousted permanently by them after a vote on his rights as a citizen.

Zero wanted a mask, and was always curious to how their weird designs drew him in, but even that was kept on lockdown the most of all. Couldn't they have at least given him one, at least the ugliest one? The stores down in the slums with fake imitations had already restricted him from access. It really made his heart sting whenever he saw other jackals with flawed traits given permission to have opportunities to buy this thing or that, touch that thing or this. Another instance of spirit-crushing was by this point the way everyone else always said his name, 'Zero,' like it was something that had to be spat out quickly. Because of this, he begun to assume that if one were to say it slowly, it might grant them lots of bad luck. Since he was usually feeling down, one day, he tried his luck for bad luck.

He sat against the tree with the oldest branches, looking like they were ready to snap just by a Flicky flapping their wings past them.

The scarred jackal drew his knees up close, the tall, double-striped grass around him a silent audience, awaiting the next instance of unfortunate events from him.

He looked up at the branch, hearing faint creaks through the layer of leaves, up there whispering as they brushed against each other. What were they saying? Maybe they talked ill will of him; it wouldn't be much of a stretch.

Zero placed his hands on his knees as he was ready to have his own name escape from his canine lips.

He was so out of it; there was barely a time where he truly felt good about himself. Nobody had seen a bright smile laid upon his face ever since he was a toddler.

"Ze...ro," the syllables swam out of his mouth. He heard a loud creak. He waited...

Nothing happened.

Then a Flicky bounced its feet on the length of one of the frail branches. It was quite active, unaware of being the one bearing evidence to his cause.

Surprisingly, the long, jagged twig was still in place. The same could be said even after the Flicky jumped from it and flew off.

That was out of the question for Zero, but it was cloudy out; maybe a storm will run its course and tap a bolt on his head. So he stayed against the trunk for minutes.

Nothing happened.

The jackal was determined, staying idle for about a passing hour. But nature did nothing to him.

Nothing happened.

Nothing but the spitefulness continued day after day, up until it was time for his banishment.

On one notable night, everything was dead silent. Nobody came out to sing any songs, to chat, to bet on their jewelry, nothing. He snuck outside, and decided to make a little fire for himself. It had been his tradition for a time—delve a hand into that bag of grinded fig skin grinds, stuff it away, spark the wood aflame, and let the dry material drip from his fingertips. There, a special spectacle danced during the night, and naturally by the Sun's rising rested off. So far, he hadn't been caught yet—luck's been on his side, for once. As always, he sat in front of the redhot flower and watched it flicker relentlessly. But for some reason, this particular fire was special to him. He didn't know why, it just _was_. The sparkling glow appeared to tell him to keep calm, and stay warm. And it seemed to be a hearty size nuzzling against all of the firewood. He brought his palms, wearing those shabby gloves, appreciating the warmth behind something so ferocious. It amazed him how this little monster caused a connection between itself and him with the power of natural comfort.

 _Dom. Dom-Dom._

Oh no. They're coming.

 _Dom-Dom. Dom-Dom. Dom-Dom._

He was getting acquainted with his cackling friend.

 _Dom. Dom-Dom._

If only they hadn't been so finicky with the way they handled heat, he would've held it close to him, and think only of good thoughts. Maybe hold a stick—?

 _Dom-Dom. Dom-Dom. Dom-Dom._

—No, it wasn't enough. He wanted to carry the whole body of flames with him.

 _Dom-Dom-Dom Dom-Dom_ _ **Dom-Dom-Dom**_ _._

The beating—it was getting louder. Zero plopped back on the ground, and crept his hands around the flame's formless shape. If he couldn't hold it, then he could embrace its fervor.

 _ **Dom-Dom Dom-Dom-Dom Dom-Dom Dom-Dom-Dom...**_

The fire shone hints of jagged shapes entrenching the nightfall. They're here. The fire had told him of how much distance the solemn patriarchs had before they could reach them. However, he tried to ignore them, tried to cling to these fleeting moments of peace with his fire.

 _ **Dom-Dom-Dom Dom-Dom Dom-Dom-Dom, Dom-Dom Dom-Dom-Dom Dom-Dom Dm-Dm Dm-Dm Dm-Dm Dm-Dm...**_

The drummers enforced a presence that was unheralded to Zero. He couldn't hide his fear as the elderlies stayed tightly-knit, all of them holding a huge staff, with the performers on either side. They knew Zero's scar was on his right, so the drummer on their left sprinkled their head and shoulders with a chalky substance, daring to walk ahead of them to place a hand on the jackal's shoulder, picking him up and twisting him around.

The chalked drummer slowly kept the canine walking forward for a bit, then stopped. Zero looked behind, saying his farewell to his friend. The other drummer detached the cloth on top of his drum barrel and leaned the huge object, causing the fire to choke on a gallon of water, shrinking it down to a smoldering pile rocking inside the firewood.

Zero bit his lip, holding back a whimper as a tear broke past a shut eyelid.

They walked around the swoon fire, and the unchalked drummer placed the cloth back on top of the drum, and continued the ominous cadence once again.

 _ **Dm-Dm Dm-Dm Dm-Dm Dm-Dm, Dom-Dom Dom-Dom Dom-Dom Dom-Dom-Dom...**_

Finally, the staff touched the poor jackal's back and the chalked drummer released him as Zero's feet start to slide against the grains of dirt. In order to further disperse the misfortune out of town, the tip of the pole was also coated in chalk. Their clan shall no more be pestered with the thought of extinction, only growth. But as Zero was forcibly pushed from town did his spirits dwindle.

People began to peek through their windows and doors. At first they looked nervous, but when Zero was passing right by them, their faces hardened into apathetic stares. It was a sign of victory over the evils that frequently invaded their civilization. Then it came time for him to slide forth past the home of his blood relatives. Zero kept his eyes on them for as long as he could. His parents tried keeping a stern face as he passed, but their honest emotions cracked through. They couldn't bear to have a stone expression while watching their own Little Boy despoiled.

And by the time his feet slid on the boundaries of the community, he reached the quartet of guards. Would they do something...? Maybe a hidden smidget of luck will come and smack into their senses to feel for his pain? His slight expectations were too grand for someone like him; they did nothing but watch as their ingrained looks continued to be stern as ever, peering down at this accursed figure. What are they thinking? How are they feeling? A fleeting moment after, the masked jackals gave him a quick shove with the stick, and then they drew it back. Within slow minutes, the town was driven back to normalcy, at least for them.

The elders were all huddled together as they spun the staff around, spreading a cloud of chalk into the air, shrinking Zero's influence into nothingness.

Tears deformed his sight's clarity as he ran deep in the woods, with his tail trembling between his fleeting legs. Now, he was by himself; the very last thing he desired yet subconsciously beckoned to. Aimless, fleeting steps later, Zero nearly panicked when the cold shiver that quickly held on his fur almost hinted at The Shadow's presence. But he had also noticed that he was able to run past thick trunks under huge branches, with the help of... _scarlet..._ Moonlight? In fact, it was shining rather brightly this night. He perched a finger across his muzzle, brushing off the rocking tears as he peered up at it.

There, he wondered if the fire did not die. Had it rose up into the air, and gave the Moon a bright, reddened glow, to guide him through the forest?

He hoped so.

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 **Trivia: The earliest drafts of this chapter involved a young Infinite, who lived alone at a forest, bullied by schoolkids from a not-too-far town, to the point he gotten a legit scar before woodland creatures drove the bullies away. Wasn't feelin it when I read it over. Was deleted by the 3rd draft.  
**

 **Other trivia: Todd McFarlane's Spiderman influenced the drum-beat scene. Drum beat based off Golden Axe 2 arcade boss theme.**

 **Some other trivia: Was hearing this while writing this ch.: /watch?v=ClJy6KzE6aQ**


	3. RENEGADE

He never had blueberry jelly before, yet it was undeniably _delicious_. The gelatinous mass ran itself between chips of white bread, the whole chunk of food coating his taste buds as he chewed. A simple dish had put his mind at peace, for once.

Inside a rather busy restaurant, the reserved Zero sat alone at a table, a whole ring of people around the lonesome fellow chatting amongst themselves as he ate. This was his best first time in a restaurant since two days ago. Every other eatery he went to was left with bleak financial outcomes, shed tears and tons of damage. He never really was one to stay in the same place, finding a job here, taking some money there, training elsewhere, and the like.

The only thing, his only friend, was that crimson blade sitting on the chair opposite from him. Its ruby color was something to behold for him, and it carried a starry glaze on the offensive end of it, with a silver curve caving its shape slightly. The dominant red reminded him of his warm friend, and it stood out from the usual browns, greens, bits of blues, and even the golds he saw back in the village he lived in, and hated...and _ravaged_ ; the latter he had done several months ago. His black, canine lips parted in amusement as he remembered seeing those elderlies cowering from him. It was one, lonely day in the forest where a simple solution to his shortcomings in combat came to him—don't think it. _Do_ it.

This simple change of thought became his turning point; his claws and fangs that he trained on many defenseless trees and stones months before did nearly all the talking for him, driving panic into the hearts of the citizens. By this point, his body was trained for extreme combat, his claws could carve deep into the most thickest tree trunks, and his teeth he constantly trained on various terrain were strengthened by a heavy amount of callous on them. When he set foot on his village for the first time in years, the whole town was ready to retaliate. The guards, the ever so apathetic guards, couldn't save face when they fought him, and the slightest grimaces they made as he went toe-to-toe with them made him feel so accomplished. Even though the quartet was impressively strong and obviously outnumbered their foe, Zero overpowered them as well! This should've been an blatant sign of surrendering, but the rest of the cannon fodder was determined, coming to the aid of their slain guardians to the face the slightly-weathered jackal. The tournament fighters, even the ones who've won so many times that they've lost what it was like to lose, were no match for the unexpected prodigy pounding them into the ground from whence his bullied body had laid. Was good luck on his side, or his unnerving strength? Either way, he was satisfied as he tore through the village as he saw fit, and he tore through it alone. The jackals have not seen anything like this, at least not in a couple generations, they have. Of course, the town was undoubtedly afraid yet in anticipation of the Unlucky's return, and before he could do further damage did they satisfy one impromptu request.

His glossy twosome-lens took a liking to the red sword which sat in the elderly shrine of the wheathside. He remembered hearing about its uniqueness, its ability to pave visibility to its color for even the most color-blinded victim to see. And it was definitely a one-of-a-kind sight, the way the beads of carmine glitter engraved in it danced restlessly against every shift and tweak of his eyes reminded him of the way the still-less fire rapidly ruptured itself against any and all things motionless. He forgotten the masks, as they never held his mind together, never gave him the comforting blanket of warmth, nor did they give him an inclination to scratch that daily, pugilistic itch that subconsciously irked him. The prime elder's aged hand shook in fear while it trudged itself to the Unlucky, its shaky fingers holding the sword of all swords. And when the scarred jackal grabbed it, all savagery seemed to dissipate from him. He simply strode through his hometown, left slashed and bitten by his own vengeance.

Before he ventured back into the outskirts again, he saw one, last opponent—his grandmother, stubborn and moved by the seeds of culture laced in their kin, standing front and center amidst the damaged horizon. Her mask was joined by an ensemble of talismans which claimed to heal what was stricken by the Unlucky. She tried keeping a strong posture, wobbling on knobby knees while both hands held her own blade. She was still capable of running straight towards her grandson, blade hoisted by her side, intending to dispel the sword he held, but Zero was faster. Unlike her, he was able to leap and get in a direct slice.

She fell to her knees as the halves of her mask clattered on the ground. She tossed her hands into her eyes while she cried, knowing that her charms failed to stop the evil, and now that her protection was broken, she too was cursed. Cursed by the renegade. Those soft cries almost made him stop walking, but his mind told him to leave with his newfound gift, his official 'peace treaty' he made in accordance with the town, in addition to saving face. And so he did. The town's fate as a whole was unknown to him; he gave him back the smiting they gave him, and he finally got what he wanted. He was known to them as a renegade jackal; ruthless in his delivery, merciful in his exit.

Nonetheless, blueberry jam tasted pretty nice compared to the thick supporting columns of straws his tongue bristled on while his teeth tore through huts.

He looked up at the chocolate, pastel orange mixture of colors plastered on the leaning ceiling, created by the illuminated chandeliers strewn about it, hovering over the chatty floor. From the corner of his eye, he thought he saw something moving on the topside, a sentient shadow among idle ones.

A kunai stabbed through the last piece of bread, slicing into the plate as a note hung around its handle.

The bridge of disturbed busybodies had noticed the sound of the weapon zipping through the air, and was now fixed on the jackal. Zero slowly turned his head, and the crowd quickly went back to their business the moment their eyes met his, and this time the cheerfulness of their conversating was now a little more attentive.

Zero didn't mind this, luck was on their side for not instigating at all. He unhinged the string off the weapon, and unfolded the letter.

...

"You carry the Crimson. But can you control it?"

...

The note was written in his tongue, to his surprise. It questioned him of his authoritative prowess. Controlling Crimson? Of course! He knew it was in his blood, countlessly swinging sticks and jabbing them into the surrounding tree trunks to point of imprinting and perforating, making them leak red sap for him to drink, unless there was something missing...maybe there was a link between himself and Crimson. Maybe this could be something good for him.

He knew this had to have been from a jackal; there were even claw marks kneaded into the corners of the note. Were there other jackals leading lives similar to his? First blueberry jam, now this. Zero's day was getting even more interesting, and he flipped the last two bits of bread into his mouth before he slipped the letter into his dreads, picking up his crimson blade.

"E-excuse me sir," a waiter beckoned, trembling as he held the crazed customer's bill in one hand.

Ignoring him, the jackal twirled around, and heard their steps carefully trudging around a column. Zero rudely squirmed past and shoved through several bystanders.

The eavesdropper had already swung himself out of the entrance when a huge hand grabbed Zero's shoulder.

"Hey—!"

"—Take your hand off me," his gruff voice announced.

And before the elephant guard said another world, Zero forcefully shoved his shoulder out of their grip and latched a clawed hand around their neck, causing the large elephant to fall. The floor shook as the others gasped while Zero threatened the security guard's face with his crimson sword.

"...I should gouge you" he grunted between calloused teeth. He released his neck, turning around, swiping his clawed fingers across a tusk in the process before seamlessly leaping off of his belly, grabbing ahold of the golden rimmed entrance as he tossed himself over it, and onto the ledge outside of the restaurant.

With one hand perched on the sill, Zero peered outwards, concentrating. In his personal horizon, a few kids were playing hopscotch, a waiter was serving a couple drinks at some other rinkydink restaurant, and someone was trying to fix those slavish mobile creatures, twisting a tool on the front of it until a spring nearly slammed into their face. Meanwhile, his nose concentrated on investigating the air, and soon enough it caught the figure's unseen scent trail within the nightly skies. He leapt, bouncing a foot off the top of a street pole, launching himself towards a slanted rooftop.

The town itself was along a steep incline, with buildings shaped to compliment the terrain. A minor complaint Zero had as he thrusted himself forwards, plodding worn shoes along the shingles of a house, holding his visionary focus on the fleeting figure. Zero jumped from chimney to chimney, somersaulting over a tower of smoke—only to see the figure disappear from his peripheral view as he advanced up the rooftop. His eyes beckoned to the right—there he was! He took note of a pole extended out from the edge of the rooftop, and drove his feet into a furious sprint, running along the length of the pole, and scrunching himself on the ballpoint of it, hoisting himself across the air as he sailed past the town's flag, and onto another ramptop of where the figure still ran.

He somersaulted as he landed, grunting from the pain spotted on his shoulder from the landing while he continued his pursuit. As he saw the figure running, Zero started to think of the possible paths they may break off to. He scanned the ground below—several cars lined next to the curb. He looked back up, taking a gamble as he surmised they were drawing their attention towards a small alleyway, and he threw his sword horizontally just as he fell off the edge of the roof.

The evading runner dodged the spinning blade, and the sword wedged itself in the crevasse between the two buildings. They kicked the sword from the gap, leaping forth with an outstretched arm, anticipating its drop after it stopped arcing, until they heard the noise of a spring—a flying Zero tossed a foot into their back, causing their aerial momentum to go forward a notch—the canine grabbed his trusted weapon once more, holding it with both hands as his body was able to line itself just enough over the other enigmatic figure, bringing the blade as high as he could. He had a jackal's high, the rush making him feel powerful. He was indeed the Crimson. And then with a battle cry, he felt himself sauntering towards the ninja while gravity took them to the ground, the prey colliding into a dumpster painfully as they rolled onto the blacktop, staying still while a crimson tip was only seconds away from puncturing them— _ting!_

A foot stopped his attack.

"Huh?" Zero looked at the one who interrupted this altercation—a jackal, female at that. Her golden eyes looked at his own dumbfounded pair while she slowly lowered her leg, her steel-tipped boot reflecting the moonlight that broke upon the dense clouds. The girl stepped back, steely eyes trained on him.

In his peripheral, the ninja rose up surprisingly fast after that harsh landing. He heard him chew on something...wasn't he? It sounded pretty faint.

All the while several other jackals scattered about rooftops on either side and fire escapes stared at him silently.

Zero didn't know what was happening, but instincts told him a fight was ready to brew, with him hunching his body low, one hand kept securely onto the handle of his sword, the other perched straight out defensively.

"It is the Crimson, held by the Scar!"

No one spoke, however. The source came from dead center, somewhere in the angular darkness in the dead end of the sloped alleyway. Zero's feet shifted a little wider.

"Together."

They all dropped to the ground, under the voice's command. They formulated into position, all in individual stances, yet signified as one through ironic disparity. Zero strummed his fingers on his weapon, palms beginning to profusely sweat. He gulped before emitting a bassy growl. It wasn't the heat of the battle that was scaring him, it was just that blackness ahead of him leaving him to wonder, to _dread_.

" _Bite!_ "

A whisk of a blur shot outwards, resembling untamed jaws and a large tongue sandwiched between them, hurtling towards him with weighty hands floating next to them.

Zero barely had time to think as he soared over the massive assaulter, who stopped their dive with huge palms careened into the sides of the buildings, crushing brick and asphalt alike.

"Hahaha! We finally found this sacred treasure!" the deep voice echoed while the targeted jackal was already in a deadly dance, swiping his sword in several directions, warding off deadly metal, all in the form of a kris, kunai, a lance, hatchet, boots—and plain ol' teeth!

From the split-second encounter, Zero surmised that those fangs were worse than his!

The jackal lashed a foot to the side, rolled under a swinging lance, slammed a hatchet out of a couple palms, swept a foot—this was new. A battle that was legitimately _intense._ The Moonlight guided his sight, but it wasn't enough. He felt things would've been in his favor had the moon been red tonight!

His sword was wedged between a lance, a hatchet and a kris, and Zero strained himself before he used his strength to counter them all away, leaping forwards into a four-way battle with the other three combatants.

For a second, he thought they were starting to back off, but was too busy to notice that a growing shadow was threatening him.

Zero grunted as a belly punched him back, straight into that slanted shadow within the alleyway as solid nothingness planted him inside itself. Felt like brick wall.

With determined steps, the crazy, gigantic jackal approached him with loud breaths streaming out between those fearsome teeth and nostrils. Tugging chains rustle around his huge belly as Zero blinked and saw clearly the one that struck him down. He weakly fell onto his knees and picked up his Crimson sword, struggling to stand on one foot when the bigger canine's huge wrist caught Zero's shoulder and threw him back into the wall as more bricks rolled off it.

Their eyes laid a dormant shade of red, tilting in tow with their owner's head as the leader clamped his hand around Zero's waist.

The smaller one still felt the sword in his hand, but the tight grip around him was slowly making him lose feeling of his body. The huge smile in front of him got even wider, even showing his dark gums as his fixed stare glazed over Zero.

Seeing this sight made Zero scared for the first time in a while. It wasn't the fact that he couldn't feel half his body, no, that was only a part of it...it was just those red eyes. The stories he heard about the Shadow bearing those lookers could make one's fur stand on edge, as it was now. Provoking any type of physical actions to harm the red-eyed beast could invite scornful pain even worse than his scar brought. And while it did that, it never blinked. Zero couldn't bat an eye because he couldn't, either. He was forced to watch the suffering clawing at them.

What made matters worse was that he was unsure if the jackal was possessed or a living, breathing representation of the dark beast. It made him shiver while his mind desperately frolicked about in his head for an answer.

The trapped renegade started to whine underneath sputtering breaths. The bigger one looked amused by this.

"Heterochromia..." he spouted out.

Every single syllable could've made Zero's body jump if it wasn't for the hand which seized most of his freedom. The two of them kept their stares at each other for a moment.

"...Don't cha see it? The luck?" the leader gave an erratic glance to the special blade as drool slid off his glistening lip, feeling his foe's feeble body shake within the giant palm.

Zero witnessed the red eyes driving a connection between themselves and the sword. The leader jackal's lip was swerved across by his hand, dampening it with saliva as he continued.

"I'm cursed, too! They said I was blind to this color because it already leaked ta' my eyes. I knew this 'ticular color, crimson, had to be visible somehow. And I can see it now...'you do, too."

His other humongous hand shot out unexpectedly for its size, clamored into the blackness, hearing it buckle from the hand's impact. "I know ya do, Lucky." He brought his claws downwards, diagonally towards Zero's ears, through the thick wall of pitch black. The smaller canine had tried his best to let his ears huddle into themselves.

The leader jackal's hands interchanged their grips, with the one above clamped onto Zero's head as his shaking became visibly apparent. Before the dominant one could utter another word, Zero brought his sword straight into his face.

It caught him.

It caught him straight between his sharp teeth as his head hung to the side, eyebrows cockily bobbing before he swung his head over a shoulder, the airborne sword dropping itself into the hands of the others.

The giant canine slowly twirled his head upright once more.

Zero was unceremoniously ripped from the shadowy wall, simply witnessing the jackals standing before the two. The shinobi stood there holding the weapon, blissfully showing its semi-faint sparkling.

"We have the Crimson now...it belongs to us, don't 'cha see?" he brought Zero's face to his. The giant canine's red eyes seemed to glow into Zero's own as his meaty fingers pressed into his head even more, nearing him closer to those lively eyes.

Their huge nose bounced up and down with every sniff.

"...I can taste your fear...and it tastes _delish_ ," he said the last word just as he bent down, straight into the smaller Zero's eyes.

"'Scars always do. And yours...heh, yours is the biggest one I've eva' seen!"

He brought a giant index finger to point accusingly at Zero in front of the others.

"Ya see this? This's the living example of a goner!"

He released Zero from his hand like a claw machine, disposing him on the ground.

Zero blinked, looking up to see the potbellied canine towering over him, yet the Moonlight towering _him_.

The fire was telling him to keep calm. He should be able to defeat him.

The confident jackal stood back up with a growl as the leader moved forward again. His efforts were stopped by a heavy swat to his torso, forcing him to buckle down and fall on his knees. And then another powerful swipe forced him on his back.

A boot stepped on his abdomen, ejecting a chestful of air out of his lungs.

"Now that we have da Crimson," the leader jackal swung his shoulders and head towards Zero's face before he continued to intimidate him.

"We get rid of you," he said casually. "Well, I do."

His giant foot taunted Zero's life, cramming weight on top of him in exchange for less air.

"Whattaya gonna do, now, Lucky? Squeak as I crush the everlasting air out of you? Outta your pathetic, lil' lungs...? Speak, speak, _speeeak..._ "

Zero's eyes were stricken with fear, and he knew it. But the more this jackal talked, the more this inner rage inside him started to boil and crack underneath that shell of fear. The bigger one started to look less like the nightly beasts, and more in lieu of one of his childhood bullies stamping their mark on him.

The leader swiped his foot back, causing Zero to slide towards him for a second before his huge hands were glued to Zero's shoulders.

"Last chance. Any last words...?"

Zero's mouth had already grew into a wide grimace along the width of his muzzle. The 'scarred' jackal's stare looked...off. Like it tampered between the bridges of frightfulness and untamed anger. It was peaking over the usual jackal's high. But the leader didn't notice it.

"Weak," the huge one's voice confidently said.

Weak.

 _Weak._

The fur on Zero's body had stood, and his mouth began to foam. The larger being, who in this split-second instance of swinging his hand down towards Zero's face, took a second to look down and notice, and that was when Zero bore his fangs.

Someone screamed, and the other did too as the ground shook several times.

It rocked the world of several sleepers, with their dreary eyes peeping through their windows, only to see the process unfold before their very eyes.

The group of the six other jackals had stayed in consolidated silence, but their faces told a different story, and their reactions contorted to the motions unbounding in front of them. But they stayed quiet, even after the grounded storm had been settled. It was a moral code worked into their subconscious as being apart of a band of thieves.

The night was quiet again, but in this little pocket of town, it was not a pleasant sight.

Animated breaths had cooled down into a milder pattern, accommodating to the quiet body of fear of which surrounded them.

Slowly, the hesitant ninja lunged his arms forward with a bowing head, heeding forth his Crimson sword.

* * *

 **Trivia: One of my fav chapters.**


	4. SHADOW

Certainly, Zero was a threat of evil that plagued his hometown, and possibly a threat to many others, yet evil always had fears of another...an evil larger in scope than he could ever be. It was something that made this Renegade drape himself in shivering fear.

This something hid in the blochets and divots of where the Sun could not see, nor its light reached. Its influence was stagnant during the Sun's shining, only to be beckoned out to form in the night.

The bad omen, as interpreted on the knittings of quilts, had the look that was somewhat indescribable. It was too dark to judge what it looked like exactly, but all imprints of it imply that it was maybe no more taller than the average, cotton-tipped canine, and its 'fur' was bundled, appeared to arc upwards to the night skies from where it had gotten its power from. It even carried two, ominous eyes that have the talent to make even strongest, fearless jackal guard shed a tear in fear of the unknown.

It was stated not to provoke it, or a 'thunderous backfire' will give the agitator permanent whiplash. And when it was all said and done, the creature banished the punished from walking distance with them ever again. Not that they _would_ be able to walk, if they weren't so lucky after. A few jackal messengers were fools to invoke anger on their first encounter with it, and it grew stronger in the absolute darkness hidden within the tight cracks and crevices in and around it after every punishment, to make its bringing pain even more chaotic. If The Shadow gotten strong enough, it may even walk amongst citizens, who're blinded by the lifelike facade it carried, although it did not have the capacity to hide those scarlet eyes, nor the horned fur and its darkened hue it carried through its temporary body. And if they were already a veteran to its 'charms,' one only could hope The Shadow never returned again; never thrice, daily, monthly, annually...it had no concept of time, leaving it to freely curse several people that had angered it.

And yet, even if there were various warnings that pertained to this being, some wanted to challenge it, to erase its existence and prove that it wasn't as strong as _it_ itself thought. They were motivated to have a bout with it, sometimes waited out in the densest part of the wooden outskirts to get the chance when it awoke. And predictably, they attacked the moment they had the opportunity.

Possibly, they would have been nervewracked by its mystical reprimandings, but sometimes, there were moments where it did not get agitated, only amused. Occasionally it was bedazzled in its tender moments of wonder of why anybody decided to bother with it. There were those rare instances where, instead of pushing you away, it pulled you in.

This was where it removed its own dimensional shape, and became an unsightly figure, hungry for attention.

And when it did, it was not there to keep you good company, only the opposite. It scraped away any traces of warmth to make one chill-boned. Those who came across The Shadow when it was in this particular mood had always felt that odd feeling. They saw its shape move, swindling along the ground as it pieced itself together.

One of its most famed curses was if one looked into its gaze for a short period of time, its disturbing fixture would be permanently seared into their eyes whenever it was dark, vividly red enough for others to see. It made the cursed afraid to sleep or blink, deliriously crazed and never the same again. It fed them imagery of light fleeting from them. It did not matter if it was the Sunlight or fire, it just dragged you away from it.

Some tainted by its 'merits' would try to fend off these inner demons on their own in order to prevent further contamination with other potential victims, but solitude could only take one so far before it drove them insane. Past the tipping point, they laughed and cackled, worshiping this spirit, talking to it as if it were a long-lost friend. Being the way it is, The Shadow could be lonely from time to time, and let them appease their appetizing thought of staying with it at the expense of their minds completely taken over by it, and made them adore the thought of residing in the deepest, darkest pocket of the real world, even if it means dying to find it. It was a spot absent of light, heat, sight and hearing. It was worse than a cave...it was the place where you would truly bond with this spirit and feed into its immense power.

Unfortunately for Zero, he was the lucky unlucky one who had found that very place his interest never sought for.

He did not know how much time had simmered by, and could not remember how he happened to come across this realm, only aware that The Shadow was embracing his presence, here. The canine was trapped by this silent beast, and tried liberating himself from its ebony embridlement, and felt unsteady because of it.

As he walked to nowhere, the scarred jackal became increasingly drunk from the amount of effort it took for him to do anything as the unknown forces pulled, bit, _shoved_ , _clawed_ , doing everything in its power to draw him to a close, and take over his conscious thereafter.

And yet, he still limped on, shivering out in the cold, cold so cold that there wasn't even wind that responded to his shivering. It was as though the chills themselves were stilted in place while he ground through the icy, 'solid' air. In contrast to the frozen cold were the tendrils that clung to him in the manner of mingling children who were lost without a guardian. But they only clung to him because he was its friend; he came to its lair, there in which inside _itself_ in fact, and did not want him to leave. The Shadow would be displeased that its kindred spirit, friend, and food supply would slip out of its control.

The scarred jackal was at the point where he simply wanted to collapse, and let The Shadow win.

What was so wrong with being with The Shadow? It cradled him, caring for him far better than the canines he grew up with. It was gradually lulling him, in its odd, little ways.

He would not have to worry about anything, because there was _nothing_. Nothing. Nothing meant no worries, no sound, no visuals, no warmth, no light.

Light.

Light... _light! Fire!_

He needed the fire! Zero could not betray the fire, the fire helped him. He was never afraid of it. It harmed whenever it was touched, but he knew deep down it meant well for him. It was his special, pouty friend. It invigorated him, never bogged him down and forced him to suffer and be handicapped in the manner he was now.

So he remained dragging his feet forward...backward...upside-down...he couldn't quite know. But he had to get _somewhere_ ; the fire was his only push.

But it was taking a toll on him.

The jackal tried screaming already. Meaningless moments ago, he felt his vocal cords tighten, his muzzle buckling between mouth and nose, and eyes narrowing from many attempts, but nothing came out, nor bounced back.

And now, Zero felt his mouth losing its moisture, the brushings of every pattering air out from his mouth running along the underridge of his nose as they stay stuck in place for his head to phase through. His throat and lungs were tightening and wheezing with every exasperating breath, yet could not hear one little thing at all.

"AH, ah, ah...ah... _ah_... _ah_..." the reverberance of a voiceless croak popped into his ears.

The sound came from him.

If he was not so exhausted, he'd be incredibly ecstatic to _hear!_

His ears worked again! He ushered his body forward with a tad bit more energy, but The Shadow tried to bog him down with its wrath! He heardfelt the constant pounding on his spirit and body, the worse percussion one could ever be apart of. It felt like big, weighty hands were clobbering his very being, like his bones were on the verge of breaking from its seismic slaps, but he kept on moving.

Their burdening pats sounded like feral, imposing drums, the blows echoing through his canine skull, sounds of a painful familiarity... but his mind could not draw the connection to that exact memory as the powerful, repetitive melody was essentially banging on his brain.

For a time, the only thing that kept his ears company was the sound of his shuddering breaths; he liked them. He realized losing other senses truly shows how valuable they are, and a crooked, dangling smile was magnetized on his face.

Wait...was that...a dot he saw?

He could _see_ now?!

It was so far away...was it sparkling?

He had to know, so he kept on moving.

It took ages, but then that pulsating glow was slowly drawn into his eyes. The sparkle...

"FIRE! Fire! Fire! ...fire _...fire...fire..."_

The fire he bonded with before his banishment. The Shadow must have stolen it from the Moon and tucked it into itself. It thought it would be impossible for the jackal find the sparkle, much less reach it. And here, all this time, it was waiting for him.

Zero did not care if it hurt to do it—he had to _grab_ it, _touch_ it, _hug_ it to finally get The Shadow's unearthly harnesses off him.

One slow foot slid past the other, the other slid past one slow foot...

His wrists were bound...he wriggled them as he longed for the fire, hearing its enlightening cackle speaking to him in its unique cooing only he could understand.

As he got closer, The Shadow's bondage on him felt looser. He felt a bit of the ethereal chains snap, the tug-o-war starting to go in his favor a bit more as Zero had been able to raise his palms, bare from the darkness. It had that nice wash of bright crimson beating on his hands as he flexed his fingers.

Finally, he came so far. It was his time to be released. He did not hesitate to bring his hands close to it.

It prickled him like bramble, but it did not sting to the point of letting go. It was licking the spaces inbetween his fingers, but his fur and skin weren't even cauterized! Suddenly he felt every single fur on his body experiencing the prickle on his palms, and it felt like The Shadow was being plucked off them as a result. He had a big smile as his eyes were enamored by his magical friend.

He kneeled down and brought it close to his gaze, feeling the heat thawing him from the surrounding cold, and return to form a rush of energy that made his fur stand.

There was something beckoning him, however, urging him to push aside this bonding for a moment, and turn around. But what if it...no, the fire wouldn't just disappear before its very own friend after a reunion in such short time.

Zero turned around, and saw the two giant eyes staring down at him.

The Shadow's size was thrice his own height, being weakened from the fire, but compact enough to be able to take on a form from its own realm, its feet extended off from Zero's own.

He saw its black teeth opening up, ready to consume him. He didn't do anything. He baited it in, seeing it plunge its weight at him—and he pulled out sparks of the fire from behind with a swipe, cutting in openings through its unusual face, and there laid newborn spaces only visible by the fire's aura.

Zero took the fire to his hands, and looked down at it.

It told him to keep calm; they were there face-to-face, together again. It beckoned him to unify itself with him, become something more.

And so he satisfied his friend's wishes, and slowly pushed it into his body, and soon enough his fur was dazzled with a fiery glow, having that brilliant color of Crimson.

"Woah," he whispered while the warm power shouted itself through his very being. He wiggled his fingers while his eyes brightened, a definite show of confidence laden throughout him.

He leapt at The Shadow and swung his claws on it, seeing its shape wither away, down to its base form, no more taller than the average cotton-tipped canine. A repeat of the legends he read.

Zero saw it on its behind, scooting away desperately as trails of black ran from its red eyes while it patted the treads of scars on its head.

It was essentially begging him for mercy.

Did it deserve payback for what it done?

It did nothing but upturn fear, and the hand-in-hand marriage of pain and suffering.

He asked himself again, _does it deserve payback for what it has done?_

He believed so.

Zero yanked his jaws open and bit down on its head with cackling teeth, gradually making the rest of its body dissipate completely, and once the last of it dispersed from between his teeth, the entire pitch-blackness around him instantly illuminated to white, and the soothing warmth was overtaking him beautifully.

He gasped.

It was a happy exhale he made when his eyelids snapped open into the breaches of reality. He was overjoyed to see the fire cooking in the hearth in front of him, and to know that finally, in his dreams, _he_ defeated The Shadow.

After years of childhood nightmares constantly interrupting his rest, being driven by a wave of unfettered fear, the lingering of The Shadow lost its grip on him.

Overcoming The Shadow in his dreams was a sign of good luck. _Very_ good luck, at that. Not many went into that place and came out alive, as told in legend. Those victorious over the spirit were usually touted as fable characters, simple rumours that defied the test of time. But the unproven myth became a reality.

The next big step was to conquer over this feared beast in a deep meditative state; that way, the mind would be bound further in spiritual durability.

But that would be for another time.

He could not stop having that big smile on his face while he nuzzled his head into the comfy pillow. The fire was truly his friend in the darkest of times, and nothing could tell him otherwise.

However, disappointment struck when Zero realized, that in the real world, he could not embrace his friend.

The jackal wished the moment lasted longer.

* * *

 **Trivia: I actually forced myself to not hear any music while making this ch. to truly capture the tone.**


	5. FAMILY

One way or another, word of mouth had been gradually spreading about their presence for the past year or so. A tightly-knit group of seven. Many foes were weak oppositions to the mercenaries, even when the pack was separated they were durable enough to handle themselves. They were a crooked lot, having no qualms in doing questionable tasks that lent them gold rings, and occasionally the familiar brass variant that other jackals would usually possess. They stole various possessions and devastatingly raided places with no discrimination, and tossed all opposers out of their way. Some rumored that the leader was the worst of them all; some said that Zero defeated the former leader in a fight, and others claimed that the former leader even died in battle. Some said that those who tried intruding their small base of operations lead to said intruders to never come back out. Others spoke of how the utterance of the word 'weak' around them, especially the leader himself, no matter the context of that homonym, would invoke a punishment that not many could safely say they came back in one piece from. All-in-all, they were a force to be reckoned by, not with.

Currently, they weren't doing anything but relaxing in Splash Canyon, the acreage littered with leaves submissive to the Autumn weather as they flowed airy rivers among the whitewaters channeling underneath them. Although the skies were clear, it was significantly chilly today. Luckily for the Jackal Squad, the people that were resided in the hut had plenty of bedding and firewood to last them for several weeks. Not-so-lucky for them was that, despite their leader still being the glue that kept these figures together, Zero became increasingly crabbier during this time of season, where the winds were out and about. But that behavior never came, surprisingly. Unbeknownst to them, Zero did the unthinkable a few nights ago, where his head simply rested on a pillow.

Had that not happen, then their leader would usually be a bit more standoffish by now. Even so, they didn't know that there was another spirit he had no inclination towards. The Foolish Wind, as he personally named it. It rolled off the tongue much better than The Nonbreakable Air Spirit. Not much was known about this particular deity, not even its depictions stood through the test of time. People debated this cause to be due to the spirit either wanting to hide something or through typical, strange deity-level humor out of boredom. However, all that was there declared of the element of the pushing air, the wind, to be an unnerving nomad. No matter if the places it threw itself around were cold or hot, it always managed to surf through these contrasting weathers. It was known to blow back jackals, especially during the seasons of fall and winter, when the Sun was farthest. Zero himself surmised that the wind had its own little charm to make the leaves pitter-patter, like foreign laughter. It was simply there to be a nuisance, always fueled by the reactions it perceived as humorous. Every once so often, it would shoot itself by and silence the flames. And Zero did not like that at all; _despised_ it. There were some beings talented enough to control the winds. A particular blue hedgehog, whom he dubbed as the 'Sapphire Wind,' would be the first person to come to mind. No matter the recognition the hedgehog had gotten for his repeated heroic efforts, Zero just did not like how the word of mouth described his innate ability to run and make the winds a wholesome beast that would only saunter to its fullest when he did.

But, as aforementioned, The Shadow was defeated, and he was well for a time. He sat by the fireplace, blocking out the other's distractions while he devoted time to meditate, eyes glued shut. He went back into that place of the lonely, dark omen, and again swept the darkness away. Zero was so passionate in doing this that his mental stimulation swooned his head, and made his back feel tingly while his eyelids parted, returning his vision to see the familiar, cackling element that calmed him down.

Feeling friendly and uppity enough, he was up for some time to spend with his comrades, and announced for some form of physical entertainment. A couple of his squad members, surprised by his mellow yet chipper behavior, surmised if he'd be kind enough to even let an outsider into their pad.

And before one would enter the newly-resided house, the entrance was divoted by the siblinghood of claw marks and sword slices, but nothing that could stop anyone's ability to walk through it. Inside, the wooden floor weightlifted all of their newfangled belongings, which had taken up quite the vertical space as well. Sitting underneath and within the cupboard was an overstocked pile of rings, a great deal of them staying put inside a huge pot, which too was also a tad diminutive for the family of currency that resided in that spot of the hut. Some of them were inside capsules, huddled around the motherly cauldron. Neighboring the money was a conglomerate of statues both new and antique, with a few damaged during the jackals' hasty migration, or simply by their own carelessness. Strangely, some of them noted the fact that all of the two-armed candles were sliced in half, the cuts Ganido suspected were by Zero's blade. The underside of a bunk bed was elevated by a pile of wedged firewood, which actually made it strangely comfier to the muscledog of the group. A couple other beds sat along the curved wall, one of them untidied. Next to one of these beds was a pillow and a padded blanket which sat on the ground, with the former accompanied by a blueberry jam stain. Sitting opposite to the fireplace was a dart board, its entertainment factor subsided by the countless scratches and stabbings undoubtedly caused by the subdued weaponry wedged into it. Other knick-knacks were placed about in the hut, from a locket, to a small chest of jewelry, to even the more modern jewels such as a radio, to which a few old-fashioned jackals were in awe by.

At the round table, the group of mercenaries sat around, in the middle of their game. A gruff jackal was gnawing on a loaf of bread as the crumbs seasoned his fur. A bottle of pop sat near the youngest of the bunch, red cap settled on his head and bandages wrapped around his extremities. Another one sat with his chair backwards, drumming his fingers on the wood, while the other one, Ganido, distinguished by a red scarf, traced his eyes on the motions of their leader, Zero. He loosened a piece off the bizarre shape of unorthodox puzzle pieces, the radio playing nu metal had been his concentration's backbone much to everyone else's dismay, although they let their commander play what he wanted as it quietly blared through the nearby device. The sole canine holding his weapon sucked his teeth as he saw Zero's success, now returning his glare back to the youngest of the group, who was next in the rotation of players.

"...This's gonna be the last time we let Aider choose something," Slash proclaimed with a dagger-eyed glare.

"Crabby again?" Aider instigated. "It's only the third time in a row you've lost—"

Aider countered his kris with his hatchet. Slash's belly nearly touched the tapered tip of the tower of shapes as he struggled against the younger jackal's hatchet with a growl.

"We can change that—"

"Boys! What's the meaning of this? We're playing a game here, not free sparring!" Ace shouted. He returned to his chair, nodding to Zero.

Their weapons parted.

"I'm sorry, it's just..." Aider trailed off as he looked at the glaring Slash with a cocky smirk.

"Yeah," the latter arrogantly nodded with a hand hoisted on his chin.

The muscledog Leash, with his huge fingers, was surprisingly meticulous when it came to playing Scattera. His sharp claws pricked the sides of one tetrahedron stuck somewhere in the abdomen of the body of complex shapes, and gingerly drew out the convex object, his tongue licking his top lip so attentively it almost dug its tip into his nostril. Finally, it was released, with little resistance.

He croaked a snicker before Slash piped up with a murmur, spinning his green scarf around.

"Heh, you're so dainty with that."

"Wanna dainty beheading?" Leash retorted, twirling the puzzle piece in his fingers.

"Who's turn is it?" Ace asked.

"Gani." Their heads spun to face the girl of the group distanced from them; sitting alone, knee bandaged, gaze concentrated on the toe-end of her boot idling on her lap as she used a sharpening tool to return the alacrity to her weaponry.

"How in the...how did you know—?"

"Because you guys go through turns in the same order. It's in the rules, you know..." Fleeter said as she vigorously scraped metal upon metal.

"Dagh, how dumb of me..." Ace sputtered quietly.

"We've been playing this for the past hour or so!" Slash responded.

"The medicine's been having my mind all screwy."

"Excuses!" Aider obnoxiously retorted.

"Tick tock, tick tock, c'mon Ganido. Choose the seed of your demise," Leash goaded the quiet canine, whose hand nearly stayed frozen in front of the shapes.

Aider started drinking a bottle of root beer.

"That was mine..." Leash murmured.

Aider spat backwash right into the bottle, some of it moistening his glove.

"...Gottem'."

The bandaged jackal shook his head, leaning his bottle to Leash. "Boy, if you weren't my friend..."

Ganido poised his fingers on his piece for the slightest second before swiftly removing it, like he always did. A section of the shape tumbled down with the motion, however.

"Oh, and Gani's out of the game!" Aider said as they clapped.

Ganido shrugged. "To my soup," he said.

"Commander Zero, s'your turn" Leash said as he perched his sneaker against the ridge of the table, leaning his weight on his chair.

A perturbed Ace spoke up on the matter.

"Why are you leaning back? That's cheating..."

"So is having a huge sword. Ya got claws, y'know—," his words stopped dead, with him having a perturbed Zero watching him. Carefully, Leash dropped his foot back on the floor. There was an awkward beat of silence, with Leash looking over to the side, scratching his head for a moment before the scarred jackal resumed playing. Leash's gaze returned to the game as well to see his commander choosing a piece from the very bottom.

Aider clapped his hands and rubbed them while Slash's eyes were glued to the bottom of puzzle pieces.

Zero's interest found a normal shape; a cube. Carefully, he was slowly pulling it out, the shape barely moving...until the piece was dislodged halfway, and the whole thing collapsed.

They clapped.

"Aw man, Commander's out!" Aider announced. He patted Zero's back. "You've been in it for a long time, too. 'Maybe next time..."

"Probably," Zero shrugged.

"Back to you, Aider," Slash said while their leader left the table.

"Okay, let us see..." Aider made his fingers dance as he examined the remaining, interlocked pieces. "I'm in it to win it, I'm in it to win it..." he went to grab one to the side.

"Oops—" the whole cluster of shapes exploded into the air, "—my bad."

Slash's kris had been uprooted through the table, and he brought his arm back with an apathetic glare as he sat back in his chair.

The action nearly costed Aider an eye as one of the pieces had slammed into his forehead.

"Ow...what's your problem?!"

"What're you complaining for? You got the beans for that. Fifty-eight of them, with eight of those 'half-ankles,' right?"

"Now you—"

"Gentlemen, let's not cut our throats just yet!" Ace intercepted. "In fact, let's have a show. We like seeing things like that, 'ay? Slash here could show us that circus trick he wanted to do."

"Slash? You mean _Shanker_ , right?"

"...My apologizes."

"'Old Timer's came early," Leash added.

Ace swung his lance across from the dart board, nearly skirting across the muscledog's chin. The former continued to play dumb for the time being, however.

He tossed his sword to Shanker, who grabbed it in the air before stomping onto the table.

"I hope you get cut in half..." Aider challenged with a smirk.

"What's that I smell?" Shanker mimicked Ace's accent with a wrinkled nose. "Salt—oh I mean white dirt? I thought Gani used it all up."

The two of them chuckled as Ace and Leash sat on their chairs, trading stares.

Fleeter remained seated, continuing to have sparks spat into the hungry flames seated on the stationary firewood.

Zero stood beside the sitting Ganido, who slurped a spoonful of soup into his mouth.

"'Mind if I join you?" Zero asked. Ganido slid over while his commander sat next to him.

The jackal removed his gloves, raising his bare palms to the fire to let the heat mingle with them for a moment before gently placing his hands on his knees, staring at the flickering flame.

Ganido was still ensconced by his meal, relishing their quiet time, at least in this corner of the household.

"I'm betting Aider's money that he can insert your whole sword," Leash bragged to Ace.

"Hey!" the younger one shouted.

Already having her fair share of entertainment watching the buffoons, Fleeter looked to the side to see the two silent jackals.

"You can thank me later."

Zero's ear perked up.

"Grazo," Ganido thanked her in his native lingo as the commander eyed Fleeter, while she held up a piece of metal and her boot.

"Heh, thank you" he snickered before he rested his eyes on the glowing enchantment again. "How's the knee?"

"It still bends. Aider tried his best, he's still just a kid," Fleeter said.

"Lost his bag of beans again?"

"Yeah. Still just a kid."

"Reasonable."

The conversation went silent again. Ganido gulped down some more of his precious soup. She always knew Ganido would be like this, it was how he was raised in his clan. But she hadn't known Zero as long. She was curious for a long while, and wanted to peek inside his psyche.

"'Feeling okay, commander?"

"As fine as I can be."

"...Um, I just wanna ask...why do you stay in front of fires all the time? Even during the Summer? I see you just baking like a potato...and you sit in front of 'em like a statue."

"The fire keeps me company."

"That's what you always—! ...That's what you always say," she reiterated quietly, out of respect. "I thought...that you were coming out of the stripes. Look around you, you have plenty of others to talk to."

Expectedly, Zero let out a nasally exhale.

"You just..."

"...don't understand? Well, I'd like to. If it's something I can't find a solution to, I'm hard-pressed to find out...if you don't mind."

Zero sighed.

Ganido brought his bowl near the fire again.

"Tell me, you ever had something that you cherished the most?" the commander asked.

"My mother's jewelry..."

"Mm-hmm... Now, have you ever talked to them?"

"Um..." Zero was always the one to sometimes ask odd questions that somehow make sense. "In fact, yeah. I do."

"Why?"

"Because I feel if I talk to them...my mother can hear me. She once told me her ears were so great she never misses a beat of what I say.."

Zero nodded as he smiled.

"It's funny; I do talk to the fire, but you don't see my mouth moving. It's more of an eye-to-eye thing, y'see. Life's flung a lot of flak at me when I was a little boy." His voice soon crept to a murmur as he continued. "In my village, everybody isolated me. There were moments where someone paid attention; they were touching, very touching. The feeling that you were dazed as someone kept slamming their foot into your back as others stood watching, and laughing." At first, Fleeter thought he was trying to humor them, until she witnessed him nonchalantly wiping a tear from his eye. "And you cry for help, with them knowing you were in trouble...they _heard_ you whine...and did nothing." Things went silent for a painful minute.

Zero's eyes watched the fire, and a bit of the depression was washed away from him, proven by his voice returning to a moderate level once more. "But when I was alone, all of my senses were observing the world around me. The way I think and see things, it's...it's something I can't get off my back. I'm just...different, even after the fact of being around you guys. Sometimes you all find ways to keep me joyed, even outside of our missions. Although I appreciate your company, I realize that the fire's what really keeps my mind collected. The sparks, the glow, the gracious warmth...they all make up one, beautiful thing. They way they destroy everything is something to see, too...almost like what's been done to me. Like the wood, I was—well—I assumed that I was apart of the pack. But once it was 'burnt down'...I knew by that point I wasn't firewood, but rather an ember who just was in the wrong group. An ember you all look up to...which I appreciate. Even after what I've done," he whispered the last sentence, eyes shying away to the side for a moment. Fleeter placed the tool on a nearby dresser before she spoke.

"No, Zero. It's alright... I understand. We love you as our leader—more than the other one."

Zero batted an eye to her. Maybe she shouldn't have brought that up, but Fleeter laced her boot on the arm of the chair anyway and continued. The fire always made her leader appear to seem more approachable.

Fleeter began taking a few slow steps toward him with a slight limp. "I'm serious. We may not lookit, but we indeed feel safer around you. You actually spent time with the guys playing games, and we can stand close to you without feeling afraid. You don't look at us like someone lookin' like they're ready to eat you,"she shuddered at the thought.

Ganido nodded.

"Agreed. And you don't force me to toss the white dirt into the flames to spite me."

That made the other two chuckle.

"I didn't want to explain this," Zero said. "But I knew the truth had to be spilled someday. Felt good," he brightened. "Thank you for listening. You too, Ganido," he said as he stood up, refitting his gloves before patting him on the shoulder. "Why don't we join the others? It's always nice to have a bit of entertainment," Zero goaded Fleeter and Ganido to the daftness of Aider juggling their weapons, with his hat over his face. "After all, we need all the fun we can get. I've already gotten in touch with a client. Big day tomorrow for the start of our venture for some big cash. A ringsack of a million in gold."

A loud cacophony of weapons hit the dull floor and table, along with a bottle of spilt soda all over Leash's shoe, but the mental endorphins in his head gushing with thoughts of the million-mark cash kept him from being angry. Aider flipped the cap back on his forehead, plopping himself off the tabletop. He, along with the others were adamantly curious to whatever else their leader had to say.

"'You serious? ...What's worth the jackpot?" she asked with interest.

"The Fatman's weapons."

* * *

 **Trivia: Early drafts of this chapter continued right off of that scrapped 2nd ch, where Inf, older now w/ a 2nd scar & his sword, resides inside an apartment, alone. Eventually this ch. evolved into what u read now.  
**

 **Other trivia: For a long time, Ganido was known as 'Eyeman,' then very briefly as 'Bufa' (I think it was based off a Spanish word) before I changed it. His final name is a mix-up of multiple African words meaning 'sight...' too bad I forgot to bookmark the pgs to let u kno what African language I used.  
**

 **Some other trivia: The term 'half-ankle' refers to 1/2 length beans Aider usually carries with him.**

 **Even more trivia: 'Coming out of the stripes,' the stripes refer to the striped grass blades.**

 **Another trivia: I kept writing Shanker's name as 'Slash' by accident in this ch. I decided to leave it in as a lil narrative gag anyway.**


	6. POTENTIAL

Today, they looked forward to gaining their next bounty—Eggman's weaponry. Never have they ever achieved a feat like this before, and they were enthused by it, Zero especially. He was already tired of the almost nauseatingly day-to-day routine he lived—doing what the client ordered, and taking names. Nowadays there was no challenge, no heavy-hitter that truly made him feel strong. Not even the authorities posed much of a threat more than a nuisance. Was this a sign that the world was telling him? Was he worthy of living the rich life that lacked the entertainment that should have came with it? Was he the catalyst for that reason? Were these clients letting them take on these weaklings on purpose? Had they been aware, influenced by his charm that now his Jackal Squad was only able to get almost mundane excursions? ...There goes the never-ending river of questions crowding his mind again. The rings never really meant anything to him other than a nice, rivulating target whenever he struck a single ring into it with a perfect, dead-on strike back at their homebase. He craved for more physical power. However, today looked like this may very well be it. He forgotten how many times he told that to himself.

Bearing matching attire of ebony, claw-tipped gloves and tipped, hi-top sneakers, Zero and his unit ran across the dusty plains amidst the bright Sun splayed across miles of dry lands which had cursed the once thriving Green Hill Zone for some time. So far they have evaded at least two sandworms, and now they were finally seeing a distinguishable object between the aching columns that slithered in the heat. Somewhere in the wavering heatwaves lied a huge pyramid that poked itself between the lower valleys of dead hills. There were two others out in the distance fading into view the closer they got. Both appeared to be unfinished, however.

"I think I see about three pyramids...which one do we choose, leader?"

"Doesn't matter. Any one of these bases are bound to have some security around their perimeters," Zero explained to Leash.

Zero's eyes dedicated their attention towards their end point, clearly visible in their current range. A smile of satisfaction ran along the side of his muzzle before he spoke.

"Remember, everyone! We get what we came for and go. And if there's too much damage on these machines, much less money on our hands. Understood?"

"Yessir," the other six say in unison.

"There's a split in the path, let's head over there" Zero pointed out.

At their destination, hundreds of yards from the entrance, guardbots slowly panned their semi-circled heads around the area, keeping everything in check.

Since they were solar-powered, they never had a day wrought with faulty power, scouting on-end for several months, ready to perform hostility if impeding action is implied.

Suddenly, servos were severed—optics were punctured with kunais—shingles of metallic shells abandoning the dead bodies. The whirring hum of the last of them careened into a shimmering, low pitch, straight into silence.

It was quiet. Zero was quick to admit disappointment, but not just yet—he felt that that was only the appetizer to a looming battle.

Maybe so.

Every one of the jackals' ears were fluttering—something big was approaching them. Some felt their stomachs quell with uncertainty, but they weren't going to back down, not with having their trusted leader there to motivate them to stick it through.

The pattering of feet felt heavy on their ears, and suddenly, it flooded through the doors—a massive swarm of smiley-faced, orange domes, all armed in equally huge weaponry.

Zero valiantly brandished his sword straightforward.

"Jackal Squad! Move in for the kill!" Zero shouted.

The band of seven ran towards the drastic amount of Egg Pawns. Hundreds of feet away, the Pawns in front lurched their guns forward and spat energy shots from them.

Heading the group, Zero spun his sword impressively fast, balls of plasma darted off of the ring of crimson. Ace and Fleeter joined him soonafter, and the three proceeded to ward off several other flits of ammunition, their weapons and feet hustled around the hair, swatting off their firepower as they bounced off and threw themselves into the rocky walls and dirt behind them.

Then, the three deflected the shots back in certain angles—all of them targeting the gun holders, for certain. They exploded expectedly, weakening the outer rim of Egg Pawns.

The other four jackals hopped over the three, and wreaked havoc on the amassing robots, tearing past the endless wave of Pawns that ran into their blades.

As he ran Leash punched one straight into its body, and the obese sphere clattered into several of them as Shanker yelled while he swung his kris around in dangerous improvisation, breaking past badnik after badnik, causing a violent stream of explosions to form, severing the monotonous stampede apart while Aider swung his hatchet from a kneeling position, straight into a bazooka holder just as Ganido's chain sickle traveled right over his head, trailing itself through the series of heads as he twisted his body and arm, scythe dancing in tandem, tearing past the fiery hordes as it forced other Egg Pawns to join their smoldering bretherin.

Fleeter slid into the cloudy dirt with the heel of her shoe, her ears confirming the fate of many a knee of the badniks as they clanged and fell on top of one another before she tossed herself back up with a vertical spin kick, severing one that nearly fell on her, the torn halves combusted while she slowly trod forward with a pivoting foot, shuffling her one-legged balance on the ball of it while the other one was unleashing a hyperactive frenzy of spin kicks that only accented the waves of slicing energy, as the force of them brought heavy knockback on the incoming Egg Pawns, involuntarily hugging themselves as the ones taking the hits were hurdled back into each other.

She snapped her gaze over her shoulder, and the other Pawns behind her decided it would be best if they ran away from her.

Leash had a school of them latched all over his body as he trudged through with heavy pace and claws that rode into their globoid bodies. One of them got the jump on him and grabbed his ear, triggering him to delve into a tumble, becoming a fuzzy boulder that brought demise for the robots on his back and the others that ran towards him, and finally throwing the ones off his arms just as he stood, shortly after.

Aider had a limb count of more than he could count while he waved his hatchet around, the black-iron aimed about to mow down badniks until he jutted his shoulder into a metallic forehead, massaging it for a quick second before vaulting over the stumbling badnik and throwing his hatchet into another, watching it collapse as he slipped past a metal hand aiming to grab him.

He pried his weapon out of the Pawn and picked up a severed foot, eagerly swinging it side to side as he scored several hits on the scatterbrained badniks which initiated a fissure of a domino effect within the swarm of them. He tossed the appendage nonchalantly while he looked at a badnik.

"Thanks," he plainly said as he stole a shield from another active Pawn—

"Shank!"

—tossing it at Shanker, who thrusted his foot into it, with the shield totaling the ones in front of them as their chrome knees buckled from collapsing on top of each other.

The two of them ran over the squirming hill of Pawns while the unfortunate, sliced remnants of a Pawn sailed over their head, some dealt with a secondary slice if they threatened to land onto their heads. The jackals' bewildered gazes found Leash yanking Egg Pawns out towards the air left and right as he laughed maniacally.

Ace swiped his lance into several of them, and a ring of explosions fizzled around him as he parried the spear of another, and shot a back kick into a potential backstabber before he swung his sword into his foe, the spear freed from its hand before he slammed its head with the handle of his sword, stepping over it as he cockily spun it into a vertical slice, horizontal slice, diagonal slice and lastly into a spinning slice that drove spherical foes out of his sight before he brought his sword down to cut apart an Egg Gun, to which the Egg Pawn backed off and disappeared into the tidal wave of orange.

He dodged a couple thick spears coming at him from either side, retaliating with a few stabs into the foes holding them—but then a lucky shot botched his attack, the sword fled from his grasp as he saw it flip in the air.

Miraculously, Zero leapt out of the torrent and spun like a flying top, using the concave ridge of his crimson sword to catch the blade of the lance, and urged more physical power to throw it out of the centripetal force his own blade was carried in, driving it back into Ace's hand.

Once Zero landed, him and Ace alike threw slashes opposite to each other, cutting through chrome as they combusted.

Zero glanced at Ace's glove, where the intertwined lacing had been split. Ace gave him a nod, and swiped his sword to the side to decapitate a Pawn before he angled it upward. The tip of his blade caught a bean.

"You're welcome!" Aider's voice called out somewhere in the sea of Eggs.

Leash shoved his arm wrist-deep through the cauterized remnants of a badnik and did the same with other, proceeding to thrash through the robots, their smiles met with burnt metal still sturdy enough to crunch their faces in as he rocketed his wrists side to side vigorously while he rampaged through the monotonous mob.

Somewhere else in the middle of the stubby chaos, Aider shook his arm to ward off one of them grabbing his wrist, pushing one away and slicing through another when he tripped over a severed foot. Soon enough, as he rose back up he tried to wrestle himself out the grasp of another Pawn, and the river of metal oranges pulled him into itself as he screamed. An airborne Ganido whisked his wrist mid-flip, a wave of shiruken fired out in all directions, nestling themselves into the group of fat badniks. The ninja pulled him out of the dead weight, to which Aider saluted his friend.

Elsewhere in the abundance of orange, Zero shoved past an Egg Pawn as he kicked off of one before brandishing his sword thrice 'round the bumbling bots, rolling his neck in time for an energy shot to pass his head, and balanced on one foot to launch a foot backward and his blade forward to defeat two more gun holders before another dared to attack him with its automatics, to which Zero swung his sword around again, angling his sword to make the shots bounceback themselves toward their feet, slowly angling his blade back up straight as the bot burst into pieces.

He tossed a metal arm backwards, catching one between the eyes as a series of bots approached him. He flipped over them, picking up a Pawn Spear in his free hand.

Despite its heaviness, Zero swiftly swung light and heavy melee weapons, both tearing past the hordes while he hurdled himself in a violent, aerial cartwheel. Various mechanical body parts dispersed through the tumultuous throng until he landed, to which he handed the huge Pawn spear to a badnik, who looked dumbfounded for a second before Zero performed a sweep kick on it into a side kick, knocking the fat bot through its duplicates as Zero continued to tear down the vast battlefield.

Then he threw his sword like a boomerang, scoring hit after hit through their dumb grins as he chased after it, ears flickering to either side to make him take passing glances at Ace and Fleeter following him as the trio vaulted over mounds of fat torsos and under the frenzy of hands wanting to hold them still. He finally caught up to his blade, with Leash flaunting his claws and Shanker rushing into the metal beings just as Ganido flicked shirukens into numerous while Aider hopped from head to head.

"Back together again; what're the odds?" Ace yelled as he and the jackals were almost back-to-back with each other.

Zero sliced through a trio of Pawns, finally seeing an opening in the sea of them. He noticed the ones here were different—they twitched for a bit. Strange. And amidst the mounds of badniks was a hover device idling within it all, and sitting in it was the obese man.

"The Fatman!" Zero uprooted his sword in front of the Egg Pawn, severing it in two. The endless number of badniks seemed to be dense around here, and things became crowded as the seven jackals huddled around.

Any single Pawn approaching the close circle of them were asking for a death sentence; Ace had used the heads of two Egg Pawns to spring himself over another, and swung downwards to decapitate a head while Shanker dodged a swinging fist and shoved an orange sphere aside before stabbing an Egg Pawn repeatedly, stopping his rampage suddenly as he turned around to disable another attacker. Aider kept a shield to buffer the energy shots before tossing it at the shooter's face just as Ganido rapped the air with more shirukens, disabling badniks and rupturing others while Fleeter destroyed a clot of them with a hook kick, even scoring a hit on one of the annoying henchmen that were clinging on Leash's back right when Zero flung a discarded hand inside a rocket launcher, and pushed the Pawn with a front snap kick seconds before the lodged debris initiated a huge explosion, and a flying mountain of Pawns dispersed into an expanding ball of rejected appendages thrown from the heated explosion.

Through the soaring flames and bodies, out came Zero, who thereafter jumping off a heated torso spun around diagonally, both hands strained tightly on the handle of his Crimson sword.

Everytime his spinning gaze met Eggman, he knew he was getting closer and closer...

With a scream he alerted the obese man at the last second, who instinctively reached out in despair...with the hand holding the very gem that gave him this power.

"Noooooo—!" he cried. But the blade was scraped against the multi-faceted object, and there was an instant flash at that moment.

The jackal landed on top of the Eggmobile, making it bob. Eggman was still alive, at circumstance's mercy. His attention drew his eyes up, and so were literately everyone else.

Zero did not know that his wish could be fully realized in a snap.

The sky withheld a shade of auburn-gold from the coughing surface, where huts sat as the wicked fires ate them monstrously. The powerful mounds of smoke appeared strong enough to choke anyone foolish enough to cross paths with them. It made the throats of jackals and man alike clammy, and their eyes moistening from the stinging particles of dust trickling around them.

Zero had only shared a portion of his secret to Fleeter and Ganido...but now, it was blown out of proportion, and to his entire group, no less.

However, the jackal was astonished to see his inner rage be expressed so breathtakingly; shocked to see his friend down on the Earth again in its pubescent form.

Eggman was starting to feel hot from the torridity wholesomely enfolding him while he tucked at his collar, face keeping a slightly concerned look regarding the matter... _sudden_ matter, at that. He had no idea what was going on, witnessing the wild scorching letting on its vast devastation.

The rest of the Jackal Squad were alarmed by their environs suddenly sheeted in devouring imagery, and one of their gazes' snapped to what they spotted cluttering the ground alongside the Pawns.

Zero darted his gaze along the terrain to see jackals of all sizes, slumped over almost lifelessly as they surrounded beneath himself and the doctor. They were familiar faces— bullies, guardian fighters, elderlies; everyone that had opposed Zero. Including his...

"Grandmother?!" He saw her breathing only just a slight, eyes clamped shut with her blade a couple feet by. He was in so much shock that he barely moved. This was not what he had in mind...or, _was it?_ Then, his ears curved to the side, and his head followed their movements.

To his side, he saw two figures trudging their aching feet towards him—

"M-mother...father?" Zero asked in disbelief.

Their hands were outstretched, destined to touch their son. They looked old, and weathered; their eyes were lost of their visual flavor, forcefed a sheen of grey from cataracts. Their greying fur had a coat of dirt tuckered in them, their clothes waved erratically to the dreadful winds that fought each other nonsensically. And their olden mouths were muttering about, but the scorching chatter of the inferno was too crowded for their wide-eyed Lil' Boy to hear.

"W-what the...?" he uttered, dumbfounded. And so were his comrades, including their robotic foes.

But as if it had rapped him on the head, the thought came to Eggman—he really could care less.

Reality hit the canine once more by the unexpected shove of Fatman's hand, knocking him off of the machine. He grimaced, falling onto the dirt, and felt the glow wholly drained away from him before he shot back at Eggman an annoyed stare, the sky bright and blue once more, and the air shy of audible activity.

"Oh ho ho ho ho!" the jolly scientist laughed as more Egg Pawns huddled close around the two. The jackal's hand started to ache with every heated pump his heart made as he saw he was on the losing side of things. "Now then, how about a little bargain?"

All of the surrounding badniks raised their weapons at Zero's head.

"You are an interesting guy, right? You and your lackeys look formidable. What are you, mercenaries? Surely this was only done for monetary gain, right, or am I right?"

Zero looked away with a sour look, not wanting to concur with Eggman outright. But his face mitigated some of the grimacing once he noticed his rage faltering slightly from the man commending their efforts. He had heard stuff about this high-profiled man, and he had a feeling he might gain a modicum of respect for him.

Eggman crept his obese body to the glass visor on his hovering Eggcraft, blocking out the Sun's blazing glare.

"Who was your client—actually, it doesn't matter. I know that they clearly couldn't and _wouldn't_ pay you all as much as I'm able to."

The scientist lent Zero a hand. What made the jackal's skin crawl was how he was still able to see that huge, toothy grin shine in correspondence to those beady teashades contrasting the large silhouetted man, underneath the glistening flare above them. Along with the wide mustache expanding from either sides of his face, in which he resembled a demented walrus.

"How about I hire you to lead my forces? I'll pay you triple—no, make it _septuple_ , all seven of you, and together, we'll take over the world. Otherwise..."

A echoing _chic-chak_ sounded around the jackals.

"So, is it a done _deal_?" Eggman continued to stare down at Zero.

Ace tried to speak up.

"Commander...what was—?"

"Boss! Did he give you a fake dream or somein'?!" Shanker interrupted. "Tell the Fatman over there to get these guys offa' me so we can get what we came for and go!"

In spite of the threat, the scientist's proposal made Zero's headache wilt away an ounce. Unlike the last time, here he was given a chance. Here, he was not talked down to as if he were worthless, despite the threat.

"Think about whatch're doing, Zero!" Fleeter yelled out, but something in her head was telling her that she was fighting a losing battle as she saw her leader stand back up with Eggman's help. "Don't be tempted by him. We'll be fine on our own!" her mouth continued to chant.

Zero glanced at her before he slowly turned, absorbing the fecund panorama, taking in the situation with an unreadable expression. The whole place was seasoned with those annoying beams as far as his eyes could see, but what was the most significant of this situation was how every single last one of his squad, his family, was held at their will. They were on their knees, awaiting an unwilling sacrifice, what with the robots' fat guns raised dangerously close to their heads. It made the chances of turning the tables over to their favor rather slim.

It even begged the question of what to say, considering the looks they were giving him. He knew questions were crowding in their minds as to what they saw when he striked that strange gem.

Then he turned his attention elsewhere, looking up at the clouds. They weren't the Moon, and he didn't particularly care for them as much, but they helped him think at times.

"Sway me once, shame on you. Sway me twice, shame on me. But it isn't like that this time," Zero brought his sight back down, to his crew. "This right here, is a recognized man..." he gestured his blade over to the Fatman's direction.

"So...is that a 'yes'?" The Fatman crossed his hands, tapping his index fingers together.

The jackal nodded.

"Foolish!"

Zero's ear twitched. The ninja's eyes widened when his leader turned to face him with a stern look.

Zero took a step towards his direction.

"It isn't what you think. Do you not see how lucky we are?" Zero's heterogeneous eyes seemingly wiggled in alliance with his thoughts. His gaze traveled to the others. "We have a chance now, a huge one! All this time, we used to steal from villages, towns, even a kingdom. We always wanted to elevate after every other huge payload and mission we scratched off our list. Now, we can take from the world. This is _something_ we longed for."

"What?!" Shanker shouted in disbelief. Zero snapped his glare to him this time. "Well not like this—!"

"We want to soar, do we not? These are a few advantages at hand: getting paid septuple, getting protection from the authorities with these robots—" he gestured a clawed finger to the smiling heaps of metal, "—and getting what we wished for."

"Zero—"

"You want to throw it all down the drain?" he asked the concerned Fleeter. "Don't think about morals when we haven't thought much of them up 'til now!"

"This isn't about morals!" the medic shouted.

"Then what is it, Aider? Explain."

Aider was caught up in his words, a mouth fumbling over them before they were even vocalized.

"You all are thinking about what's good versus what's bad, right? You didn't think twice when you stole that amulet from that poor, little girl, nor the time where you snatched the elderly's lottery money, Aider. Now that we have the opportunity, we just back off from it?" Zero said with a befuddled look strewn across his band of comrades.

"I-it's a trap," the younger jackal finally retorted. Zero trained his eyes on him again. "'Just...just because he's not doing anything doesn't mean he's _not_ stalling! You saw that magic he put out on us! He's a full-on, anti-jackal maniac, that's what he is. And he's just startin'! Look at us, Commander! We are trapped!"

A slight nod dabbled on the unfazed Zero's head.

"Suppose your right...then, I won't hesitate to take him out if he tries anything. But I'm siding with my own thoughts. It isn't a trap, and I know it's not. Because if it were, we would've been silenced during our bickering. That says quite a lot about the Eggman."

Aider had a look of distraught—he had a level of confidence with his Commander's words, but the mere presence of the Fatman made him uneasy.

"Imagine your reward if you defeat my arch-nemesis, Sonic the Hedgehog! This is definitely a thing not worth being blasted point-blank in the head if you deny this good fortune, hmm?" Eggman incited.

 _The Sapphire Wind_ , Zero mused. Of course the jackal had heard of the struggles Fatman had had with the blue hedgehog, but besides that, personally, Zero did not want to admit that they had no choice but to join Eggman. It would have downplayed his role as the leader in their eyes. But he really had _no_ other choice if his endgame was to gain more power. His personal goal was and had always been that, same with the others. In addition, he had a bond with his comrades, and had listened to their ambitions, and dutifully noted that he will help them satisfy their luxuries, given the opportunity. And now, he was about to take it.

"I am not doing this to spite you all. I'm only doing this because it is the best for us."

Zero stabbed his weapon into the ground as its makeshift sheath, and strode to the doctor, giving him a confirming handshake.

"So you wanna burn the whole world down, eh?!" Leash exclaimed, thinking that his leader is hiding something.

"...Yeah!" Aider added. Leash became a tad louder.

"Is that what this is about all along?!"

"...Boss...?" Ace's question nervously crept out of his throat.

"No, Leash. It's not—!"

"Hold on, let me handle this!" Zero dismissed the female jackal with a palm flayed in her direction.

Zero approached the muscledog, who moved nary a muscle while he was held down by five Egg Pawns. They were nose-to-nose when the scarred one spoke.

"I'll repeat myself. It _isn't_ what you _think_ ," he delivered with jaws shut and eyes fixed on his friend. He saw those calloused teeth gnawing at his own glaring gaze, but Leash challenged him again.

"Then what was that we saw when you attacked Eggman, Commander? Ain't there a reason for that?"

"If you had your past spoiled instead, you wouldn't be so talkative right now." Zero flared his nose. "Listen, this was my promise—your promise, _our_ promise," the jackal gestured his thumb and index finger to and fro respectively.

"We do what we do best, get paid for it in full, and live out our dreams the way we imagined! This is our _chance_ to do all that, how many times do I have to _say_ it? I care for you, and they do, too—" he pointed at the other canines, "—in spite of our discrepancies. I'm looking out for every single one o' you, no questions asked, and I'm one never to leave anybody in our squad out of the bigger picture. What you saw was my own, greedy desires, and I as your leader apologize for showing you that." And that was genuine regret, Leash realized from the slightly-regretful tone of voice there. "I'm bound to sacrifice my own ambitions to seek for yours to come true. And if you interpreted that _misgiving_ as you witnessed as the true endgame for _all_ of us, then you are sadly mistaken, Praire." Leash's brow heightened from the utterance of his birthname. "You guys are _family_ , and I can _never_ deny that!" His gaze darted around the other six before it returned to Leash's. Zero spoke again with a lowered voice. "I want to make sure you all prosper in happy lives. Understood?" He to a growled.

Things grew quiet.

Leash saw in Zero's eyes that what he said was true. He nodded in reconciliation.

Zero turned around to face Eggman.

"Release them," he commanded.

Eggman snapped his fingers. In response, the Pawns' clutches were vanquished at his command, liberating the canines from their stubby fingers. The pack looked around attentively to see the metallic minions nary a trace of their harmfulness they had moments ago before reclaiming their downed weapons as they, along with Zero approached each other.

He saw their eyes. Some carried agreement, others of uncertainty, a couple with a hint of resentment. But it was natural for them to disagree. Zero gestured with his head. His mouth parted into a smile, the particular one that enforced that what he was doing was going to benefit them tenfold in ways they didn't imagine possible. In no time was their eyes sharing snippets of the optimism he held.

They collided their weapons into each other, before drawing them up altogether.

"We strike until the Moon's light is no more bright!" Zero exclaimed.

* * *

 **EDIT as of 6/24/2018: Fixed some sents that didn't make sense.**

 **Trivia: Used to be the ch. I cared least about. Hopefully it doesn't seem that way, now.  
**

 **Other trivia: 'Rise of Infinite' comic on steroids.**

 **Some other trivia: I listened to this (helped out a lot while writing this): /watch?v=uTPpblLXIZU**


	7. ULTIMATE

The lights, however repetitive they may be in their visual rhythm of shifting colors of reds and blues, greens and pinks, were so mesmerizing to the eye. It was almost like a harmony between the ancient and modern eras, with the abundance of plant life welcoming anyone adventurous enough to traverse through itself and the warm, shallow waters riding on the scalp of dirt paths rummaging throughout the body of palm trees, all fully illuminated by the brilliant neon glitter, wrapped and coiled around bodies of trees and rocks, and the ancient ruins of a deceased civilization. It was almost as though the technology managed to breathe new life into the drab reds of the old buildings.

Fleeter was astonished by Mystic Jungle's wondrous sight, lucky to be a part of the chosen squad unit to uphold security here. She sat on the sturdy edge of an aged railing, tapping her fingers on her elbows with her arms crossed, looking around. She was wrong all along; the doctor actually offered her and the crew what he said after raiding Gigalopolis Zone for its fair share of titanium. And because of their efforts, within the thickest part of the forest, development of the doctor's secret weapon was underway right now. There were teased at a prize in return if they keep up securing this place long enough. In addition, her friends got the chance to start living the good life. All of them had a huge gym which allowed them enough space to train and hone their skills. Alongside that, each were given a personal room, sizes for each of them appropriately structured by the Egg Pawns to accommodate their desires. Distinctively, their doors had huge golden plates with their names etched to them for good measure.

Leash went ahead and started making the 'half-a-mile-wide' diorama he always wanted to do, Aider was surprisingly modest enough to have a small room to dedicate on finishing up a book based off his personal research on the Pedura beans and their 'half-ankle' counterparts before finding a publisher, Ganido and Shanker gotten a room full of a lifetime supply of soda and a room whose wall was filled to the brim with canned soup respectively due to a screw up caused by one of the Pawns, resulting in its discardment into the scrap heap. Ace had a bed literately made of golden, sapphire-jeweled coins, whose gratuitous amount had gotten a bit smaller every other time he returned to his room, and Fleeter simply wanted to have an outdoor balcony, enamored by them for some reason after seeing one in a tale, and luckily for her she got a decent view of some of the last greenly parts of Green Hill. As for their leader, Zero, he paid his dues, and simply wanted a room with a fireplace of some kind; he decidedly went for the room containing a furnace, and despite some of his comrades being stupefied by this, they let him be. As usual, Zero kept things to himself, although he visited the others every once in a while, to make sure if things were going well for them.

Even though she was getting paid septuple, it came at the cost of some action, with her and the squad being relegated as security guards and all. Every once in a while she saw an oddball moment of a couple Motobugs fighting each other over a Caterkiller, to an Egg Pawn tripping over its own two, mechanical left feet as its other robotic associates chuckled. It was weird that she was helping the very things she was set out to destroy. The journey itself to Eggman's much smaller base was quite a ways to go before they finally reached it. Despite all that, she would—

"Squad Jackal! Squad Jackal, this is Eggman! The intruder Shadow is attempting to overthrow Mystic Jungle! Your captain has terminated his escort mission and is immediately returning to base! In the meantime, get rid of him!" The static burped the message to silence.

Fleeter stood up, canine ears aptly searching around, sniffs wiggling into her nose. She leapt off the railing, straight into the water. The only thing that displeased her about this place was how it made your shoes wet, but she bet the corrosion on her shoes probably amounts to nothing.

A little less than a mile away, red-rimmed skates swerved along the ground, causing the dirt to crack under the aura of heat surrounding the thrusters that fireplaned Shadow a couple centimeters from the ground.

Nothing was on his mind, just the mission. Although he did note how Eggman decided to get assistance from animals all of a sudden. Last time that happened, it was with him and Rouge. However, all that mattered right now was to infiltrate the base and find any leads to disrupt Eggman's upcoming dictatorship.

He leaned himself forward, pouring more energy into his skates as they corresponded to his physical work and speed, thrusting him across the grounds even faster. He approached a shuttle loop. Using his momentum, he skirted along the curvature of the formation before gravity brought him back down once more. He went up along an incline afterward, and not too long after did he have his sights set on the Mystic Jungle base entrance half a mile away. For him, a large parabola of a hill should suffice. He concentrated on building up enough speed, and went down the curved decline of the hill in a tight somersault, spinning effortlessly upwards, launching his body straight into the air. Perfect.

Nonchalantly, he spread his arms like wings, feeling the gravity rushing him downwards yet again before he spun himself into a drop kick, landing on the fat pillar lying below, the force fracturing its surface slightly.

Shadow stared ahead; he saw a lone jackal.

"Hmph."

He jumped off the pillar, and with a splash did he continue to approach her, ignoring the water coating his fur as he rushed his body into a small leap—and a speeding foot sprung forward. She sidestepped, and Shadow skidded around to a stop, steam rushing away from his feet as the then-calm waters shifted uncomfortably to its new inhabitant.

"'Shadow,' isn't it?" Fleeter asked. "You got some nerve calling yourself the 'Ultimate Lifeform'. I can smell through your cockiness right now; can tell you that you've overestimated yourself."

"Where is this conversation going?" the ebony hedgehog asked, seemingly more inclined to swatting droplets of water off his glove.

Shadow instantly jerked his shoulder to the side as several shiruken sliced past him, cutting into the formless mass.

Out of the shadows, the rest of the group appeared all around their target.

Shadow peered over his shoulder, and quickly scanned to see the ring of canines that emerged around him, ready to take him down.

"To ask of you of one thing—do you live your title?" she said as she prepared to get into her fighting stance.

Fleeter chopped through the air twice with her powerful legs, each scything wave cutting close to Shadow, who backflipped and ducked underneath the thin, deadly weight of Ace's lance attempting to halve him from behind. To his side, he dodged each of Aider's slices, parrying the final slice with his inhibitor ring and backhanding the side of the jackal's head. He spotted from the corner of his eye Leash's rushing mass leaping off the wall as he bashed a shoulder into Ganido right before he flipped over the claw-bearer, perfectly in tune with a leaping Shanker colliding into Shadow, with the two falling into the water. Shanker tried to push his kris straight into Shadow's face, but the downed hedgehog collided his knee into the foe's belly and pushed him off his body. Leash pounced on him again, but Shadow leapt onto his feet and gave him a headbutt to the face within a flash, the rest of the mercenaries barely getting out of the way as the reversed momentum knocked him back several yards, causing several bumps in the submerged dirt path. Ace had flipped over him mid-tumble, slicing at Shadow, who swerved himself side-to-side, simultaneously with Fleeter attempting to do same, only to have their respective metal weapons sharpening against each other.

Shadow sicked his wrists out at their necks, stunning them both, but Ganido grabbed him from behind and jumped into the air, flipping the two of them into the izuna drop. Shadow wrestled himself out his grasp, and landed the drop on the ninja, crushing the air out his lungs with his knees pressing hard on his chest. Shadow jumped off of Ganido once Shanker tossed a fist at his face, and Shanker tried again with an elbow jab leading into a palm strike and then a quick punch-punch into a knife flip, and finally into a handle-strike, with Shadow swiftly dodging every single attempted hit in this rather-elaborate combo. The two of them immediately yanked themselves away from an airborne hatchet, with Shanker's surprise stab cut short by Shadow's crossed wrists. Within a second of Shadow's counter, Fleeter knocked back the huge hatchet with a steel-tipped boot, and Shanker ducked and worked his way back up with a few swipes of his melee weapon right after, the last failed stab coinciding with Aider ricocheting his own hatchet right back at Shadow, who dropped into a somersault, dodging Fleeter's snapback strike on the weapon, which had planted itself into the mud with a reactionary wiggle upon impact.

Shadow spun back up with a harsh kick at the hatchet, with it flung right at Shanker who evaded before it sliced his legs open. The action was so fast for them to the point where Shadow had already kicked a foot off of Fleeter's shoulder and performed a double-kick maneuver, the first foot slamming into its Kris holder and the other into the jackal medic, sweeping them both off their feet.

The masterful kicker met her match as Shadow dodged an overhead kick, feeling the alacrity of the attack cutting the air and making the fur on his arm part before he gave her a rapid one-two maneuver, quickly jabbing her in the gut and on the shoulder, the sheer strength of the strikes making her yelp as she fell with a splash.

The scattered water had seemingly spawned a sickle longing for his chest, a _shwinging_ noise rung through his ears as he hopped back, with the weapon spinning a full revolution before it was caught by the hand of Ganido, who stood in a ready stance, eyes glared at his foe.

Careful steps in the mud inched him closer, with Shadow vigilantly easing him near as well. Shadow teased with a fast leg raise, putting it back down with a slight smile before he rolled to the side just as a lance struck down into the ground. Once Shadow was right-side up did he dodge another threatening slash of the sickle, rolling in the waters as Ace tried another swipe with his sword, jabbing the blunt end of it at him several times with Shadow attentively dodging each stab as his ears kept watch of the sickle's ring—he heard the weapon assailing—shoved a wrist into the chain, which wrapped itself around his wrist it—which is exactly what the hedgehog wanted.

Within the blink of an eye, he yanked his arm forcefully as he flipped over Ace's sword, careening his skates into the swordbearer's face—the chain's noise buckling closer as the chain itself had entangled into a mess—Shadow jumped up, feeling his weight rotate as he launched a foot into Ganido's chest once his axis was directly upside-down, making the poor jackal release his hold on the weapon, and right into a brick railing.

Shadow brought a foot down on the wooden handle, shattering the wood into fragments.

Aider had dropped a bean into Fleeter's mouth, who chewed it in two bites. They nodded at each other before they helped one another up, along with a healed Shanker standing alongside his other two comrades.

In front of them was the lone warrior, carrying a stolen lance in one hand, a wrapped chain on the other arm.

Fleeter jumped to a pillar and hurdled off of it—Aider ran towards him and lead his feet into a slide—Shanker flung himself into the air, both buff arms held over his ears with his kris held tight in his hands. All of this happening simultaneously, but Shadow didn't even shuffle nor traveled his gaze an inch.

As the trio prepared to bombard their enemy, a blue flash caused the chain and sword to fell fall into the water without hesitance.

Fleeter landed an accidental hit into the back of Shanker's head, who toppled over Aider. Both of them were now down for the count as she stood, peering around the area. The only one still standing—a flash of energy took place from above.

She promptly knew who it was, and sliced her foot upwards at Shadow, who somersaulted at the same time, catching the agile mercenary between his ankles, slamming her face-first into the water.

Shadow looked up to see Aider rising once more. The bandaged jackal turned around, but it was too late. He went unconscious, unaware of the fact that he was promptly served a brisk strike to the head, the utter force leading him to do a headstand in the wet surface.

Leash sprung once more from behind, but Shadow grabbed him single-handedly from the air and slammed him into the watery surface, flat out laying a flurry of powerful punches until several of the jackal's front teeth flew out. With little resistance, Shadow picked him off the ground, with a battle cry he tossed the largest canine of them all into a thick column, the structure bending inwards in crumbling fashion.

As the last of the bricks splashed into the water, Shadow noticed the sploshing noises of another a good distance away from him. He turned around, witnessing a desperate Shanker, with a huge lump on the back of his head, looking around for his weapon. Slowly, Shadow trod himself to the lone canine, whose anxious whimpering got louder with every progressive step, and as Shadow inched closer did Shanker's eyes grew larger.

The hedgehog stood right in front of Shanker, who simply peered upward like a scared child.

"Boo."

Shanker yelped and turned his head around, trying to make a quick escape—and collided headfirst into an olden pillar, knocking himself unconscious.

The Ultimate Lifeform lightly shook his head in amusement in light of the canine's untimely 'demise.' He breathed out through his nostrils as he rolled a wrist.

"'Live your title,' huh?" Shadow recited.

He pushed a button on the communicator laced around a glove cuff.

"I'm done with them."

"...Nice of you to say 'hi', Shadow," Rogue spoke through the communicator. "And who's 'them?'"

"Squad Jackal," he plainly responded. "They were nothing significant. I'm heading further within Mystic Jungle. I'll update you when I discover anything."

"Wait a minute, Shadow...you didn't—"

"No." He plainly responded. "At best, a broken nose. At worst, a broken collarbone" Shadow told her as he scanned the comatose group.

Rouge sighed.

"Trust me," he said. But he lied; the hedgehog knew somebody's arm had to be snapped during the scuffle.

"From what it sounds like, I can't say you killed anyone." She giggled. "Good going, Shadie. Keep doing what you're doing," she said enthusiastically.

"Right," he clicked off the button with a headshake. Rouge always found a way to slip that stupid nickname into their conversations. Only a matter of time before she taunted his pride with another sobriquet, but pushing those thoughts aside, Shadow made a quick scan of the area before jetting off into Eggman's tropical base.

Several minutes later, a sound emitted from their wristwatches, countered by a couple, quiet moans soonafter.

"—ackal. Squad Jackal, this is Eggman. Has Shadow been taken care of? Hello, this is Eggman. Hello? _Hello?!_ " Audible clanking noises generated out of frustration sounded through their communicators.

A pair of hi-tops entered the scene, slowing down to a full stop. Silently gushing with fury, hand cramping up in accordance, Zero gradually strode through the aftermath. Absolutely every member of his Squad had been brought down by Shadow's wrath.

He was too ashamed to give Eggman a response.

With a death-grip coiled around the crimson hilt of his blade, Zero was deadset on eliminating this formidable, strong opponent.

* * *

 **Trivia: My most favorite ch. involving a fight. Prolly 'cuz I was listening to this:/watch?v=HEa3oT_iSPk**

 **Other trivia: Pedura beans are a reference to Shenzu beans from DB.**

 **Some other trivia: The fight was mostly influenced by the battles seen in Winter Soldier, and maybe The Raid.**


	8. RUSE

They'd been at it for a while, Shadow and Zero. The former was remaining dominant in his speed, thrashing through the weaker oppositions of Pawns and Motobugs, and had already gotten past the maze of ancient water funnels which were readily equipped with an aggregate of booby traps that barely stopped the intruder's pace.

The pursued hedgehog ran faster than Zero could, but the remaining canine was headstrong, despite the odds implying to be against him. It was already too late to deviate the course; the trail of mechanical carcasses curved along a grassy path, towards the gap between where he ran and the hedgehog presumably stood; which was where the entrance of Eggman's sacred laboratory was located.

"Hey, you!" Fatman piped up. "I know you can hear me!" he exclaimed over the communicator as Zero nimbly jumped from pillar to pillar, his shiny gloves and sneakers highlighted in faint lime.

"You're captain of Squad Jackal, aren't you?!" He would retort that with a snark comment, considering that they'd already known each other for two months, but he let it slide, settling on the last pillar that leaned over the edge of land, where Shadow had stopped to.

Were Zero's assumptions of him being an incarnate of The Shadow were wrong? After all, he was _literately_ standing right in front of the door, ready to fulfill his and his comrade's failures as guards.

"Your squad was useless!" Fatman was right. Those words sadly rang true, and for a second, the strong beating of his heart went blank.

 _And soon, the same can be said about you._

His doubtful mind's been bothering him ever since he first looked at Shadow as he chased him down. He thwarted off that thought tugging at his mind, defined by an uncertain truth. There was no way Shadow could handle him—he was their leader. But this rebel brought a battle against a body of six to his favor. Zero, however, had the natural dexterity, instincts, and leadership skills that made him squad commander.

 _You're just wasting your time. Don't fight him_ —look at him. No weapons, nowhere near the speeds of the Sapphire Wind it implied, no train of thought it seems, nothing. He looked like he embodied style more than anything.

 _You saw your useless squad. They were all nearly motionless._

Zero couldn't find Aider's bag of Pedura beans to heal them; he hoped they could live another day.

"Go clean up their mess already—!"

" _Alright_ ," Zero spat, clicking off the transmission so fast he was unsure if Eggman heard his response, but he didn't care. But did Eggman really wait that long to respond as he thought—? No way, time was only going at a slower pace in his head.

 _Don't do it_ —do it. _Don't even try_ —do try.

 _Do it and you'll lose, just like how you lost all throughout your life. Look at his appearance—his dark fur—_

—Do it and you'll prove your strength. This is your first good challenge in many a moon, and it'd be unspeakably embarrassing to back off and let Shadow proceed with his destruction.

Perhaps that was true, but he tucked the attention of the uncertain chemistry of anxiety to the back of his head, in spite of a part of it churning his belly.

He's hiding behind a lit pillar that's right in front of the door. Make up your mind now.

A padded glove squeaked from his tight clenching. Zero was starting to question if this was truly the Shadow he was sent after, the same one that Eggman spoke about in a degree of hatred. He looked harmless, totally clueless it seemed. This was the guy that destroyed his squad? His family? And he wasn't...doing anything. He stared aimlessly at his wrist, and neither of his lips had moved. Why? The jackal couldn't stop entertaining his curious mind with these questions.

He slid his legs apart, knees bent, fists closed, his blackened canine lips unveiling a sneer of jagged unevenness. Moment of truth; with a forced exhale through his nostrils, Zero ushered himself straight into his target. Through the gust of wind, Shadow simply glimpsed at him, before a fuzz of blue energy warped him away.

"What?" he said with concern as his hi-tops slid onto the copper ground.

Where did he—he heard a surge of energy and felt a presence materialize behind him and he instantly swiped his sword around, only cutting thin air once again.

Where is he?!

His ears searched the air for any hints to his location. A small huff—and a twist of the hilt and a large slice followed. At the same time he saw his opponent disappear once more.

A rapid thought hit him in the head. He took a gamble and tossed his weapon aside, as Shadow simultaneously reappeared, taking a cursory pivot to the side, feeling the blade sever a mere couple strands off his bundle of chest tuft.

Zero leapt with a grandiose knee attack, and in that split-second interim, he saw Shadow's eyes. They were blood red, just like the ones the huge jackal had. He was also able to see the rest of him clearly; his fur was horned upwards, into the skies amidst the night.

He should have suspected this earlier...

No way...it cannot be.

The mercenary landed on his feet, with no broken hedgehog teeth lapsed onto his leg. He saw his appearance upclose for only about a couple seconds, but it was him...it was _it!_ Shadow— _The Shadow_ , was here, toying with him. He was a bit frightened, but stiff irritatedness was present on his face for an ounce before his blacked lips parted into existence, with a row of jagged, unevenly-sharp teeth standing interlocked as a feral growl hustled between the ivory rows.

An ear spotted his target, and from the corner of his eye he saw the annoying pest. Zero stood still for several seconds, waiting impatiently. He twisted his body, grasping his fallen sword from the ground.

And Shadow stood there with a level of poise, arms crossed. The Moonlight was outlining him, a false light to The Shadow. An index finger tapped lightly on his arm, eyes stagnant on his foe.

To Zero, this was crazy. The two of them standing apart, the valiant jackal versus the unnerving nightmare, subtlely taunting the former in one of its numerous forms. It resembled the Sapphire Wind to a degree, and it must have chosen that particular body to annoy him further.

At his birthing headache's expense, afixed between them was a lit torch, carrying the element that vanquished this creature from the crevasses of his mind. Zero hopped with a spin, slicing his sword into the fire before he landed.

A bit of confidence returned to the canine, while his eyes looked between the illuminated blade and The Shadow. If he was able to overcome The Shadow in his dreams, then evidently it had to be the case outside of the netherrealms of his mind.

It was silent again for a beat, either one waiting for the first strike. Patience spread thin, Zero charged forth and the jackal spun into the air with his brandished sword, with Shadow staying still.

His sword only hit an inhibitor ring. And the other, then back to the one he first striked. Shadow countered every blow, watching them as his rings bled oodles of sparks from his quick strikes. Zero changed it up, going for a low blow into a curved slice towards the opponent's chin, to which the hedgehog leapt over and ducked under correspondingly, and then jabbed an elbow right at Zero's gut, who yanked his torso back right before he side-flipped over The Shadow's punch. Shadow swung his fists, both of them bounded back by the crimson sword before he jumped up and spun a foot around twice, with Zero scrapping his fiery blade against the hoverskate. In return, Zero jutted his blade forward once Shadow landed, his body faced to the side, leaning his head back from the jackal's attempted stab before bringing his wrist up, down and up in correspondence with sword's following stabs. The hedgehog moved himself back with another parry as the twirling Zero came at him with a spinning maneuver with his sword, tossing a series of pertinent strikes at him as Shadow steadily kept himself alert before Zero came at him again with another fierce, spinning slash.

Shadow got risky and went for a sidekick, getting the canine directly in his shoulder just as the blazing blade assailed over his quills.

The canine was launched back a couple yards, and bounced on his back, the momentum curling his feet over his head, and he followed through the motion by sliding back upright, dragging the extinguished crimson sword through the ground to ease the deceleration.

His ears caught the sound of the incoming attack—Zero kept his weapon in the ground—in the point-blank interim, he sailed a shoulder back just as he grabbed Shadow's airborne leg, and grunted as he used the propulsion to twirl himself and the foe around, releasing the hedgehog straight towards the pillar he hid behind previously.

Shadow recovered, careening both of his feet into the pillar, and jumped off it, the force causing the stone pillar's structure to lean back just as Zero had already leaped into the air, butt-end of his sword facing outwards at Shadow.

Zero grunted as he used his strength to jettison the weapon right over Shadow's head seconds before the two collided and hit the ground.

On their backs, the jackal was able to get Shadow within an armlock, feeling his spines prickling the side of his face as a jostled elbow went into the former's belly once, _twice_ —and Zero twisted his head and sunken his teeth into Shadow's shoulder. The hedgehog shouted—the sword had bounced off of the corner of the wall, right past two branches which belonged to a tree, reversing its speed—and shooting right through the fire that was on the fixed torch.

Shadow twisted himself out of the grab, and the two flipped out of the way just as the flaming sword rocketed into the ground blade-first.

The two were each perched on a knee, either one's eyes flitted between themselves and the sword. Shadow was squeezing his shoulder and widening his nostrils from the dirty trick while his opponent kept a hand perched on his abdomen, subtlely jabbing him with a faint smirk. He and the Moonlight were working in tandem; if it can get hurt, then he can kill it.

Zero drove a leaping spin kick right on the handle of the sword, provoking it to a wake-up call as it spun up several feet. Meanwhile the two fighters were in it again—the two traded attacks counterbalanced by parries until Shadow batted a palm into Zero's elbow with his bad arm, and twisted the jackal's wrist with one hand, ringing the pain through him. The sword was heading for the wrong target—Zero grimaced through the pain and propelled himself into a horizontal flip, liberating himself from Shadow's grasp and fastening his trusty sword back in his fingers mid-spin before he landed.

Shadow had disappeared, and the jackal wasn't given the opportunity to reevaluate his lifelong foe's new spot before he felt firm fingers around several of his white dreadlocks pulling him back, sweeping Zero off his feet. Zero swung his blade, but had it kicked out of his hand, the sword rocketeering straight into one the bowing columns above the dense waters.

The hedgehog fired a one-two punch combo into Zero's face, and in no time the jackal was hoisted up by the neck.

The Shadow wrenched him close to his face, and the slightly-winded Zero started digging his claws into the hedgehog's hand when he was ejected straight back, right over the cliff they were on, and towards one of the submerged towers that were in the lake.

The hedgehog turned around, gritting his teeth as fire bursted through his skates, and with a battle cry he drew a punch into the metal door, which shuddered as it received a crunch into the middle of it.

Just as that happened, Zero spun around the pillar with his claws, spinning with thoughts of possible brainwashing from the beast when they were eye-to-eye as sparks of lime trickled away from his claws, before he unlodged his sword and leapt from that pole to the next, jumping off only to land near the idle torch, as intended.

The ebony hedgehog had teleported himself next to Zero, who had jumped high enough to evade the flame's licks, reaching his sword into it again as the two elements bonded with each other. Then, Zero brought a long slice through the torch, and the fire fell on the ground, beginning to spread itself across the patches of grass, freed from the platform that crowded the flames into itself.

The two circled around each other while their flickering throng steadily grew. Shadow sneered, revealing his fangs while Zero growled with his hardened teeth. He had to overcome his demons and banish The Shadow away from him! The fire was his audience, his friend, an ally in battle. The fuel to his fire!

"Come on!" the latter beckoned as he drew his Crimson sword to his side.

And Shadow came at him with rage—one turbulent kick came after another, and they were only amplified by the trails of fire that complemented with his skates. Zero's mind was screaming at how the fire was naive enough to assist the very thing the two were spiritually _unified_ to destroy!

Zero was running off his own adrenaline, and the cooking blade seared through the air with strikes of animosity as they loudly rang against Shadow's shoes, until one of them had cut across an ankle cuff, to which it burnt. He did not know this, but Shadow felt the blade slightly flay his leg.

In brute retaliation, Shadow finally scored a kick into Zero's wrist, the force wrought a scream from Zero's lungs as it caused his wrist to collide into the wall behind him, making him drop his weapon.

Shadow backflipped towards the door and threw a side kick into the surprisingly-resistant metal.

He did not know that he struck the hand that bonded itself with Zero's head whenever he had a thumping headache. The pain was popping through the respective body parts, and he was never more angry than he was now.

Epinephrine unlocked him from the restrictions of pain as he snatched his sword off the ground before he rebounded off the wall, both hands perched tight as ever on the sword as he spun around with it.

Shadow almost gotten the brute edge of things as the attacks drew two new, glowing cuts on the metal door, one of them slicing through the wheel, to which it split apart. The ferocious Zero was only driven by his ultimate goal to utterly kill his dark foe.

The hedgehog was a bit astonished to see how durable this jackal was, and felt each rapid strike _reverberate_ through his wrists as Crimson upon ring clanged loudly. Shadow was actually starting to struggle slightly against his barrage, and was a bit unfocused from Zero's sudden vigor before a shoulder barge drove him back several feet, crashing into the leaning pillar.

 _Ting!_ Shadow heard the swelling noise of blade meeting earth dangerously close between his chin and shoulder, fortunate enough to raise his head just a speck.

The fortunate hedgehog yanked himself away from the pillar just a second before Zero's flying foot had swung right into the pedestal, shiving off a large chunk of stone as the brute force made it timber towards Shadow, who somersaulted out of his spot.

The angry foe realized his grave mistake—stuck in the wall next to the column was his sword! Zero hurled both of his feet into the base of the leaning pillar to switch its direction.

As the beaten column collapsed, the jackal sensed The Shadow's presence and swiped his hand at him, only getting a bit of his spines while Shadow slid underneath his arm. Zero twisted himself as he brought upon his foe several spinning kicks, the first of which successfully blocked off, but the latter two caught the hedgehog, and his back pressed into the wedged handle from the force of them.

"Gygh!"

Shadow quickly swiped away several of Zero's claw swings and then swiftly pulled out the sword's handle in an attempt to cram it into the jackal's jaw.

No!

Zero swiped at Shadow's wrist, who dodged the attack and jabbed the handle into his face. He fell, but swung his foot across, kicking the blade out of The Shadow's hands and straight into the door.

Shadow combated Zero with a handswipe into a fake front kick—the latter gesturing a downwards dodge—and Shadow brought upon him a roundhouse kick, sending him flying towards the middle of their little battlefield, smothering some of the flames during his landing.

Zero stood back up, dirt trailing off disheveled fur as he bared his claws and teeth. Shadow slid himself into a flip, but Zero vaulted over his hoverskates and brought Shadow back into the dirt once he was upside-up. He stomped his sneaker on Shadow's belly, who felt the crude impact while he was slid closer to him by the same foot, face close enough for Zero to go down and _slash_ —! Grimacing, Shadow had swung his hand, hitting it into Zero's wrist before he got back on his feet again, coming at him with a sideways fist, but Zero swatted it away and got in close, throwing his jaws on him.

The crazed canine open his eyes to see The Shadow's glove and felt the ring tugging at his toughened teeth while he kept hold of Shadow's other wrist. He was blinded by his own heightened excitement, trying to _pull_ the inhibitor ring off his wrist.

There was a flash.

Eyelids clamped shut, his teeth were relieved of their pressure as fibers of the ring's energy trailed out from it and his mouth. The ring dropped and twirled on the ground a few inches from them.

Zero had not realized what he had done.

The jackal had went for Shadow once more with a punch, but the hedgehog simply stood, grabbing his fist. The strike felt like it rebounded itself off of Shadow's hand and stumbled back onto his, and the grab instantly made his knee dig into the ground as The Shadow looked at him with a face that read no mercy, the smile already confirming the fate of the ultimate victor. Zero was squinting and groaning while he felt something popped or two as Shadow kept pressing down with the hand naked of its ring.

The Shadow had its own _light_ to hold back its dark arts? He couldn't let it get its other ring of light off of its restricted hand!

Zero screamed as he wrung his hand at him, but Shadow had already released his cramped fist, and within seconds he bolstered on his own palm while he drove a low sweep into the jackal, then another— _and another_ —!

Each strike shotgunned gusts of wind, the last vortex of the trio bigger than the first two combined as Zero's body had spun quicker from Shadow's progressive attacks, the sporadic fire around them already shrunken down into increments of itself.

Spinning uncontrollably, Zero's body was met with an unrestricted fist that flung him straight across the air, inches above the incinerated grounds. Unluckily for the wretched mercenary, Shadow had clicked the other ring off and teleported.

Before the aerial Zero's back met door, the canine sawfelt a blur of red swung upwards into his chest, a burst of liberated energy knocking him straight into the air—lungs nearly emptied of oxygen—a blurry pile of balled fists dove for his head—

—Where am I? What is this? Has the planet had been turned on its _side?!_

Memories of current relevance came rushing back while he felt an influx of agony slapping his ribs as he bounced off his side. During this, he saw his discarded sword shoved deep into the door, suffocating inside the thick metal as its bearer reached out a hand several feet away, wishing to free it. Before long, another blur of black and red assaulted him—swatting him straight into the stone wall near the last remaining stone pillar.

Zero crashed into the rock wall, yards of cracks instantly delved into it as chunks of debris were sneezed out of the cloud of dust which spat Zero out onto the ground not long after.

He was breathless, lungs gasping for air as he breathed in airborne fragments of dirt which had clung to his eyes.

He wobbled his exhausted self onto his bottom, hissing through his teeth from the injuries painted onto his muscles. Then, he saw a figure cascading in the plumes of dust approaching him. A contorted grunt was all Zero said, his feet squirming backwards as his back was firing tendrils of pain with every single instance of movement.

Seconds later, his eyes shot wide open once his injury came in contact with a pillar. A yelp was stuck in his throat while he meekly tried to push the stone back, to get away, but he was trapped in pain and dust all-around.

Bright bundles of twin light swooned through the cloud, and out came The Shadow—and the Crimson!

"Hmph, worthless," it spoke, irises stained with red overlooking his own pair which motioned with the squirming Zero, who held a hand over his face. At this moment, everything crawled in slow motion for the shameful jackal. Between his fingers, Zero saw it watching his every move.

The Shadow was holding his sword, examining it with those gruesome, red eyes. What will happen to him now? Will this dark omen make quick work of him like he did to his squad? There was a narrow chance of him escaping from this ebony premonition, but he was out of breath, his throat and nose stinging from exasperation, and he started to develop a degree of claustrophobia, enclosed within an absurdly-small ring of slabs, his back stuck right against a huge totem pole nearly made him yell in pain. Was this The Shadow's sacrificial ring?!

Then, The Shadow frowned at his weapon. Maybe it predicated a dissatisfaction had it used his sword on him? And then the reckoned force merely tossed it over him, the blade coming dangerously close to his head as it whirled away. No! His prized possession, exiled by this creature. He knew he wasn't going to be lucky as the Crimson.

His stare slowly perched itself upon The Shadow again. It stood tall, its precedence like a living, breathing skyscraper with two, unreadable eyes. Zero couldn't get enough air to enter his lungs without it shuffling back out as his other hand shifted behind him, feeling nothing but wall.

Stay back, _stay back..._

One metallic hoverskate of the standing monstrosity brought itself forth, inching the creature's influence even closer to Zero's diminishing esteem.

"Don't show your pathetic face around me ever again," it commanded masterfully, the word 'pathetic' igniting a surely-pathetic whimper outwards at him. He never heard it speak, and to hear it for the first time, was daunting. Its voice was so heavy and giant, like an aural spirit yanking his ears open full-force to make sure he heard it crystal-clear. To him, it sounded much louder than his pounding heart. The Shadow was...disturbing, and commanding!

"O-okay!" Zero yelled, both of his hands outward, trying to push that growing, invisible aura of him away. But its influence was taking a toll on his mind. "S...stay back, stay back, stay back..." he quietly reiterated, each utterance of the phrase increasingly quieter than the last. It felt like his voice box was shrinking by the second.

Shadow glowered his brow.

Stay back _, stay back, stay back..._

The feeble jackal only imagined the suffering he would have went through had it continued following through with its assault! It stared at him for a second longer, with those red eyes that must have came from a place so dark and conceited even he couldn't fathom what that place was _like_. Had an inkling of pity poised itself on its fixed gaze?! Desperately, he hung onto that thought.

Please, spare me. Oh so help me please, _please!_

Within seconds, the torturesome creature was gone—assimilating into the club of smoke and dust that danced among themselves.

The breathless fighter now had both of his hands plastered on his face, with a persistent shivering drubbing him completely.

Suddenly, he heard otherworldly groaning. What was happening?! His heart couldn't stop beating fast til the sound of gimped metal filled his ears, followed by the sound of fleeting hoverskates.

The wind was howling around him, crunches of pebbles bouncing off their bigger cousins as the remnants of the fire were now mere sparks attempting to balance themselves on the remaining blades of grass.

Zero sat there, mind blank, in disbelief. This wasn't supposed to happen—

He trained. By the Moon's glow, did he train so much in the forest. He made sure to assume authority over the little critters who respected his presence and didn't dare to fight back whenever he made a tree lurch over from weeks of trained slices and bites. And in turn made every one of those jackals in his 'home' _fear_ him!

When he only fended for himself, whenever the Moon was not there to nurture him through the night, he tried making fires. If matters were made worse, when there were heavy winds pounding themselves through the leaves, he meditated.

He did not want The Shadow to curse him further. He was already laced within the middling line between good and ill wills that attempt to marry him at either side.

The various developments—the bonding with his racksack family, the virtues of training to their utmost limit, the defeat of his fears swimming in his mind, to be ready for this fateful moment—were demolished.

But he couldn't believe it. Shadow, the incarnation of _The_ Shadow, had struggled, even harmed! It almost had his soul riddled with darkness when their eyes met each other within _centimeters_. But little did he knew that The Shadow's powers were hidden under the bondage of those rings around its wrists. He thought they were there for decoration, to mock anybody that opposed its influence, its beliefs. They even had that false sense of assurance everytime they chimed when something struck against them. But no...they were _holding_ back its power.

The Shadow took full control when that happened. He thought then and there it was time for him to be fleeted into the afterlife. Every strike it made on him flaunted immense strength that he never felt before—he was befuddled by them even though they splintered jiblets— _chunks_ of pain throughout his body. And for a fleeting moment did he actually return to its realm during its onslaught! The strikes shockwaved to the point where his trusted fire was sprayed with wind—for a moment he had wondered if it were related to the Sapphire Wind.

Everything fell apart, it was so _unbelievable_. Was all this an apparition? He had to know...he had to know!

He had to make sure; he went to stand, and turned around to see his sword just before it collapsed—no! He reacted to the Crimson, the Slayer of the Shadow, falling from the cliff it desperately seethed onto as pain continued to toy with Zero's body, hands clinging onto the pillar nearby.

The jackal felt a piece of him lost when his ears jerked to the sound of the sword submerging into the river. Slowly, he slid down against the column until his behind sat on the ground again.

It was gone. The Crimson sword was gone, pathetically facing a watery fate in the Mystic Jungle's river.

He felt himself beginning to choke up.

Zero twisted his body around to lay on his back, still feeling the knot of pain when his body slapped on its side.

Then he realized something—he saw his hand, shaking. Arm, wrist, palm, fingers—all alike, trembling. He felt his whole body vibrating.

Zero's nose could still smell the aura that the Shadow had threatened to chokehold him with. Its smell...he couldn't really describe it clearly if he could...but it made him powerless, docile...

"... _Afraid_...!?"

His gaze couldn't take itself off of the defining answer; his quivering palm. Zero brought his palm to his face, covering his eyes. Yes, his hand should comfort him, surely so...

But then he backed it away from him, paranoia giving him an inclination to detach his palm and closed eyelids alike, for if The Shadow had defeated him in the real world, then it could smite him in his mind again!

He ran through the lines The Shadow had told him. He was told to be worthless...pathetic...

"Me... _p...p-pathetic?_ " he silently cried out. He was in slight denial, but the truth was told. The truth was never false.

"He said I was weak?" he shakily thought aloud, bringing a knee to the ground so he could rise again, but as he staggered, his mind went numb again. No...no this wasn't possible.

Was that the message the ominous Shadow was telling him? The canine had heard this phrase touted in tow with him. Weakness was something that embraced him, relished in his presence, no matter how much he'd tried to run away from it.

It put him down, made him feel guilty of himself, always nagging on him...but it also made him disgusted. Enraged. His fear had turned into straight anger. And when that happened, it could take a prickling of a hair to truly set him off. His shoulders rode a riled oscillation, flowing up and down from heaving breaths.

He was still in one piece, he could still fight...the sword—it was only an _extension_ , not a _representation_ of him.

Yes!

"No!" he spat out instead, in the context of fighting his inner demons.

 _You are weak._

"I'm not...I'm not weak," he said, hands shaking in correspondence to his denials. "I'm...I'm not weak, that's not who I am..." Zero shook his head.

"I'm not—!" his hands brushed on along his face into his messy dreadlocks, which ruffled with his shaking head. "I can't be...I..."

Splitting through his fury was a rush of excitement squirming was to eject. It wasn't comfortable. His eyes darted around, and he felt every nerve prickle from the overabundance of stimuli possessing him.

"I... _I_..."

He leaned forward, as if the burden was actually weighing hindrance to his head.

He sucked in his breath—

" _URRRAAAAAAAAAGH!_ " he screamed a yell that tore through the air, echoing so loudly that it awoke the small critters across several yards.

He turned around and proceeded to slash away at the pillar he laid against. Tears were swept off the ridge of his muzzle as he twisted his body back and forth, claws driven deep into the mossy stone as chunks of them were forcefully nudged off of the tall shape.

And then he stopped, his chest bringing in and expelling excessive amounts of oxygen as the pillar's top half drunkedly balanced itself on its newly-chiseled base.

Zero's hands disappeared into his white dreads again, and he dropped on the ground just when the pillar fell over by his side.

He dug his face into his palms, and they were wrung back out as he screamed to the skies with bellowing cries.

"I did everything! You _saw_ it! _All of it!_ I trained my family, I trained myself! I meditated, _meditated!_ I'm strong! I'm not pathetic or worthless! I'm... _I'm_..." his chest was heaving as his mind was lost in thought.

He did not see the small lot of critters perched over the plateaus of rock from above, who made nary a sound as they saw the depressed jackal. The majority of them were already shaking from an even larger ruckus of tampered terra moments before they heard the dirt-ridden jackal's screams.

The affliction was thumping his mind as he hiccuped a cry, and laid his hands onto the edge of the rock where which The Shadow had previously stood. A chilly feeling assaulted him and made his fur stand on-end.

He huddled close into himself, just like he did all those years ago when this exact feeling of goosebumps cascaded on the surface of his skin. And with that, he heard the leaves whispering at him again. The wind was there to mock him again.

From whence anger had settled in his head came sadness' pain, and he tried to hold back his tears. He did not want his soft side to slip out, but the abundance of its persistence was too much. He was only able to silence his wails, but more of his tears were drawn out, and tapped the surface of the earth.

Zero sniffled again, and his body twitched to his weeping in synchronization with his voice crinkling into saddened breaths. It was no point in fighting it back now; he let it all out, with the melting columns of tears coating his cheeks, and the loose secretion of snot clinging to the rock from wet nostrils. He licked his lips, tasting a bitter, salty tear as he held on the stone as tight as he could.

He shook his head.

"What good am I for?" he drawled quietly to himself with a nasally sniffle, along with a newly-formed bubble of phlegm emerging from his nose. A Flicky landed itself on a rock near him, apprehensively finding the right moment to comfort him.

It nearly chirped as it was started by the double beep signaling on Zero's watch, rather loudly into his ear, but no pain amounted to what he felt right now.

The man was on the line, and bespoke with a degree of disappointment, expecting the results to be not-so-optimistic as he imagined.

"Alright Captain, tell me the news. Hello, come in. This is Eggman. Come in..."

His mind processed his commander's comments into drowning blurbs, the cacophony intruding his moment. Zero slowly removed his wristwatch once the Flicky began to hop to him and then he thrusted the object into the wall nearby, scaring off the Flicky while he smothered it back and forth before he removed his hand, relieving pressure from the earth as particles of the watch sprinkled the ground from the earthen wall.

Zero watched the ground in front of him sleeping in ashes. There, the fire was nearly nonexistent, its presence appeared to be far away, like he was pulled away from them.

And he went back to crying once more. He cried, and cried, and cried, until he was awake no more. He slept, silently whimpering in his sleep as more tears flowed through closed eyes, and his fingers rigidly scraped along the rock with a slow crawl.

* * *

 **Trivia: I reheard the song I posted on ch. 6 while writing the fight.**

 **Other trivia: Ep. Shadow flashback scene on them 'roids.**

 **Some other trivia: The scene where Zero screams into the sky was inspired by a certain scene in Xmen Apocalypse...**


	9. SALVATION

Combing through the sectors and corridors that was littered inside the latest of the Doctor's lairs strewn in the dead green hills would lead one to a section dedicated to prisoners. It was not as well-lit nor moderately tempatured as the other locations in the pyramid, but that was the intention. So far, only a couple of them were occupied. Inside one of them was a jackal. Appropriately, he should have been tossed with the rest of his kind, but this was simply a means of psychological torture. But it appeared that it wasn't so grueling for this one jackal.

He was simply inside his own cell, borderline rotting as he kept his head down, with a face permanently wrapped in pain. His body became thinner from a lack of eating, and fur disheveled from a lack of self-perseverance. He forced his appetite to a crumb, a droplet, and the sanitized air. He felt he didn't deserve the Doctor's mercy, however flat it may be.

For weeks, Zero stayed put inside his personal quarters, and never really did much besides sitting on the floor, with virtually nothing else to keep him comfort, other than the prison bars that he trickled a sad finger across to hear its whines seethe into those pathetic ears of his. It was dark inside his little home, and he believed it was something he deserved. Whenever he turned his body, he winced, but never complained. He sat there in pain, silently dealing with his body's feeble attempt to heal him from The Shadow's blows.

Zero would have those occasional dreams of The Shadow again, and when it approached him, he never opposed nor protested. Why fight the unbeatable? Instead he sunk into its ebony drapes, swallowed whole into its influence, returning to the cold, lifeless place of where nobody else inhabited, not even the flames. It felt comfortable to suffer and feel his own life slowly slip away from his fingertips. He was so heartbroken everytime he woke up out of that place. For him, there was nothing to look forward to in the fixtures of reality. And ironically, he was always looking forward to nothing in the blank slate of his dreams. He adored the feeling of his heavy eyelids finally giving in, blanketing all shameful things from those twosome-lens.

At least when he was up, he liked how dormant his cell was; his own personal place to sit and have his mind silently relish in pessimism. No apologizes, no sympathy... It was the perfect punishment for him, if it weren't for those figures right across the hallway, in the cell opposite from his.

The jackal never even tossed a glance at his brothers and sister who sat in cell opposite from his, despite his ears acknowledging their presence with occasional flickering.

Had there been moderate light to adhere his sight, he probably would've had the courage to take a peek at his family. And if he did, then his heart would have sank even harder, to see them completely covered in castings and bandages, tangible things that could never repair the intangible presence of pride. They should be angry at him, since their 'leader' led them to the insurmountable downfall. Yet, they called to him inside their crowded cell. They tried many times to appease his depression.

"Try to liven up, Zero! How 'bout you guess these lyrics! ...Uh...hey, Aider! You 'member them, right?" some voiced grunted.

"I was about to eat some of my stale flat bread, but I reckon with my good hand I could slide it your way!" some weird voice with an accent said.

"Zurr, rurk ah wut I cundo!" a gruff voice squabbled out of swollen cheeks.

"Don't be ashamed! Everyone gets at least one defeat in their lives! Some more than others, but life's like that! We're here for you, Zero!" some girl spouted out.

"'I'm the toughest of terrors! I am the darkest of days!' C'mon Commander, you know the rest!" a voice younger than all the rest shouted.

"Commander, the difference between insanity and growth is that one relies on the same, exact actions expecting something different, and the other values being aware of your shortcomings to fulfill that difference. Trust in my words," a voice quietly sharpened its way into his ears. Zero thought being called 'foolish' suited himself much better.

Who were these people, slavishly calling out to something they shouldn't be wasting their time with?

His family? Those jackals weren't his...his pathetic greed only made him _steal_ them!

He only had one, little trick to make these 'kindred spirits' dwindle their barks down. The simple gesture of ignoring; he faced his back to them and laid on his side, the same side that The Shadow drew pain out from, intentionally. The floor was suitably cold, as always, and he crossed his arms, curled his tail to fit with the rest of his fetal-positioned body, and lowered his ears, waiting for everything to be quiet.

Things came for the worse, or in this case for the better, when one day, two Egg Pawns approached his cell. Their presence was never deceiving; their feet always clicked, servos turned with mechanized whirring, and that off-kilter, tinny dialect they carried. And of course, their rotund shape.

He was expecting two-day old, expired eggs on a plate, as per usual.

But instead, he heard the metal of a lock turn, but had no interest toward what this led to.

"What are they..."

"Hey! What're you holding?! Hey!"

"Where are you taking Commander?!"

"Zurr, Zurr! Wurch urt!"

'Commander'? Seemed like a title too highly for him, he thought.

The bars made a silent wince when they were opened. Two pairs of clanky feet approached Zero, and then he felt their cold hands pick him up by his arms like a marionette, with him sitting on his bottom.

His eyes never left the ground. Although his ears were somewhat curious, twitching to the noise of the other Pawn, who got right up next to him.

Zero did not know what was happening, nor did he intend to care.

Something punctured his shoulder.

It was a needle, seeping some substance into him. Grogginess washed over Zero, just like his dreams.

As his consciousness slowly slipped away from him, he enjoyed this moment. Finally, he was casted away from the ones who praised him as a 'leader' once again. At last, it would be quiet again. And he was unsure of whether he was going to wake up out of it.

Zero did not care, because he could not care. The two Pawns each held up a shoulder as they dragged his body out.

The rest of his surrogate family were calling to him, angered over their repeated failings to regain the relationship they once had with their leader. A few of them called the Egg Pawns with colorful terms as they didn't respond, obedient to their duties. Some of the jackals weeped, wondering if their leader will encounter an exile of which they may never see him again. A couple wanted to tear apart the cell they were in, but their castings restricted them from doing so. So all they did, and all they could do, was howl out.

Zero did not hear them, because he could not hear.

But then he did. He cared, and heard once more. Awake, his ears experienced machines humming; it had been his lullaby for some time. And those annoying voices were absent for some reason...

Zero felt his instincts beckoning to rub the dreariness from his eyes, but his darkened soul was strong enough to make him be idle to almost anything at this point.

His stare steadily formed plausible objects out of the family of globs, to something implausible.

Two Pawns forced him back on his feet again.

The back of his mind commented on how this place looked vastly different to the one he was in previously...seconds ago, it seemed like. Much brighter, also. He was disappointed that he hadn't lasted a moment inside the discouraging rituals of the dream world.

The place had a growling aura that made his spine shiver, but this sad canine came all too amused by this feeling.

Then he started contemplating the Pawns' point of interest. Maybe the scrap heap? The incinerator? Places like those would finally quench his thirst of having ultimate defeat, seeing how he was all too weak to reach it himself.

For an eventual time, he saw the floor take on a dark shine of clean, perfect chrome. Faint reflections of violet light danced around his sneakers, but his same two feet he had seen day after day had put a better impression on him than anything else.

After several slow minutes had passed, and the Pawns had taken a step back, he was standing there alone, several steps from the table at which the Eggman and his strange, orb-shaped companion were seated by.

Zero had not seen the doctor in quite some time, and there was comfort to be had witnessing his presence. For once, his eyes trailed up, from a pair of padded boots, the zipper of a scarlet coat, to the trio of pince-nez glasses, pink nose and ginger mustache.

The doctor had a brow slightly hitched atop his eyes, hands on his knees as his ginger whiskers bobbed only the slightest bit.

Then, he did something different.

He removed his glasses, the action so ferociously gentle, like a feline's landing. Eggman felt his holdback on his anger waning as he nearly snapped the fragile things in halves. The smaller, spherical servant was simply twiddling his thumbs, feeling awkward while he shifted his gaze between the floor and Zero, who stared at the doctor with empty eyes that started to withhold an iota of fear.

"I did that so I wouldn't be so tempted to use them for _hazardous_ purposes," Eggman said.

This was unexpected. The air around them grew increasingly cold as those tiny eyes looked straight at Zero's own while Orbot inched away from his creator as silently as possible.

Creepily, Eggman's glare was dead-set on him, his body frozen in immense concentration. Despite the fat fellow blinking constantly even though there was a moderate level of light within this place, Zero actually experienced fear again. He couldn't look away from those little beads of egg-white that carried pinholes of bright blue, blinking intermittently, sensitive to seeing things without a tinge of cerulean layered in front. Yet, his glare was not to be taken for granted. The jackal hadn't noticed a minute into the stare-off that he himself was beginning to shake a little. Before, he was used to being second-to-none, but this was just too much. He wonders if this...Eggman have powers of his own, too?

Nobody made a sound for a good half-minute until the loud noise of the scientist clearing his throat exploded the heated silence. He stood up, pinching his nose as he turned his back to the jackal. Then, he rotated himself to the side, with the jackal only partially seeing Eggman's face while he saw a fist open and close like a relentless claw aiming to strangle anything it came in contact with.

"Zero...the one I trusted. The one who _vowed_ to take over the world with me. The one who I sacrificed so many, many rings, to pour my trust...into _you_ — _!,"_ he twisted back at the frightened jackal, with trembling hands and stiffened fingers shivering in anger in front of Zero's face. The canine wondered if his fingers were cold from defeat.

"—And your squad," Eggman finished in an abrupt, placid tone as his hands were released of its graceless anger that bounced inside the big man. He rubbed his gloved forefinger over his bare brow, right below those terrifying, arctic eyes. They just...kept...staring at him.

"We might have wasted our time that fateful day, you and I. One of us should've stood as the other fell, laying in that _barren_ wasteland...forever," he whispered the last word. "But look where we are now. Alive, and suffering because of it. Plans for world domination, delayed. _Delayed_ because of one hedgehog _you_ said _you_ were capable of handling. Was he even Sonic...? If you surmised he wasn't, correct! _He was_ — _!"_

He nearly wrought havoc on his spectacles with a fist so tight it might as well have weakened the threading of his glove. Eggman took a deep breath, and slowly lowered his hand. Zero had an ounce of pity for the inanimate object that was incapable of fear itself.

"He was not." The scientist began to slowly pace back and forth while he reprimanded. "But were you the Ultimate Mercenary, however? Were your promises of your family thriving in power as one ascertained in reality? I have mixed feelings about those answers...I need more time on the matter."

He stopped in front of the table again. Zero had not yet taken a glance away from the icy stare that seemed to compel his own to follow.

"But," he said with a heavy sigh. "Insufficiencies occur. Things like this wish I still had hair on my dome to pull out—feels less painful than pulling out the mustache, if I remember correctly. Maybe your dreadlocks could compensate. Nonetheless..."

Eggman held a finger obnoxiously close to Zero, but he did not back down, not even bite. His stare was now fixed obediently on the gloved finger that reprimanded him. It lessened the stress from staring into the gaze unfocused behind it.

"This is your one, final chance, _Zero_ " Eggman spouted. The manner in which the jackal's name was strangled on its way out of a flustered man's mouth made him jerk for once.

Dr. Eggman lurched himself back, and picked up his spectacles, adjusting them back into place over those cold, blue irises. Zero's body relaxed in response as Eggman folded his arms behind his back.

"Circumstances led me to this, mind you. In other words, you are one, _excessively_ lucky individual.

"This is my compromise. Do a good job—we'll be well on our way to victory. Fail to meet my expectations—well," he chuckled, "I always needed an extra bit of bone marrow to strengthen the alloys on my badniks," he said with a twinge of twisted amusement, no thanks to the huge grin nearly meeting either ends of his facial hair.

Zero too smiled at his last comment, but Eggman seemed to have mistook that as a smile provoked by fear. No, that smile was only fueled by his self-deprecation. And then the Doctor stood straight, one hand behind his back with the other in front.

"Orbot!" he commanded his lackey.

"On it, boss." Orbot clamored his tinny fingers on a keyboard, and pressed a button to crack open the strange contraption planted on the table before them, to which Zero finally took notice of.

Compressed steam rolled out of the egg-shaped shell, and the noises of interlocked metal dispersed as the nuts and bolts were undone, and out came the prize extended out on a thin platform.

Zero peered on at what was unveiled to him.

The meek canine stared at the the mask, which carried an attractive darkness to it. The jackal always appreciated the 'jackaleyes' imprinted onto the earpieces of the various other masks he saw as a child, and his interest returned once he saw this particular element present on this one. The best part of it was the asymmetrical qualities of the jagged crimson visor on one side, and its dark, blank-spaced companion on the other side seemingly balancing themselves admirably along the tapering shape of the object, catering to his facial shape.

"That's right. Got your attention now, didn't I?" the fat fellow said with a smirk."This is all I have so far...the result of some research on your kind. An amalgamated replica based on the jackals' beliefs on modesty. I'm not sure what's more brilliant—the fact that I spent hours on this, or how I was able to recover the blueprints for it."

Zero's hands reached for it, and he simply stared at his new possession with gleaming eyes. He never thought he would see something like this again. Did this Eggman reached into his mind and pulled out the past for him to see...for him to _touch?_

The jackal cradled it carefully in his clawed hands as he sniffled at it, shoulders shyly hunching, eyes moistening. For a moment, he was a pup once more, standing next to his father amongst the elderlies, one of whom let him hold a mask in his feeble palms.

"What are you waiting for...?" Eggman questioned, ignorant of the nostalgia washing over the canine's mind. "Put it on. I don't have all day."

Zero placed the mask carefully over his face, caressing the object with thoughtful care. It fit him comfortably, and it was nice and snug over his shameful face.

"It is...it's very thoughtful of you, f...doctor." His voice trembled slightly, his head drooped a slight angle. A tear fell from the bottom edge of the mask as his yellow eye looked at the scientist. Somehow, it comforted him to see everything moderately tinged in red, in addition to not being able to see through the eye that carried the mark that scorned his family; a fitting punishment, it seemed.

Eggman breathed through his nostrils, "That was only half of what you receive...and before we continue, I want to verify something. Listen good, and repeat this oath after me: You swear your allegiance to the Eggman Empire."

Before, Zero probably would not have bothered with this insipid, slavishness the Doctor brought about. But now, he was desperate. The mask he now carried was a tease. What else was he going to bring back from the past...his sword, the Crimson? He needed to _know!_

"I swear my allegiance to the Eggman Empire" the canine plainly reiterated.

"You will help me bound every opposer to every whim my Empire desires."

"I will help you bound every opposer to every whim your Empire desires."

"You will have control..."

"I will have control."

"...and the power..."

"And the power..." the masked one said with a tinge of enthusiasm.

"...if and only if you serve and satisfy my needs."

"...if and only if...I serve and satisfy your needs."

"All hail..."

"...the Eggman Empire."

"Excellent! You got the words right out of my mouth! Maybe you are a good, lil' jackal, after all. Just with flawed intentions" Eggman cracked another smile.

"And for that, I'll spoil you with your second treat" the fat fellow said darkly.

Eggman simply took a glance at Orbot.

"Orbot."

He nodded and pushed a button on the keypad, and ahead of the three, the floor leveled down a step, and several steps were revealed to be leading down a story.

"Step in."

Zero was uncertain about this, but the doctor had promised him control and power. And so with willful steps he went into the dark room, only lit by a few dim lights that gave a faint idea of what was in store.

Once he leveled himself off the last step, he observed the place. There were several sealers spread symmetrically around the whole circular plane of the floor.

The one in front of him started to shift and breathe as air was released from the tight lips of metal, with several layers of chrome doors opening up right after another, and each one drawing closer and closer to the light, which gave out the illuminating attraction, just like his dream.

"Drop in."

He looked back to see Eggman and Orbot standing at the rim of the entrance, watching him.

Zero looked down at the stagnant light again. This was crazy. Was he reentering _that_ dream from which had left him?

Every step that inched towards the whitening portal made him have a huge smile hidden away by his new gift while his tail wagged.

He was born anew, skewed from his previous creed, his previous shamefulness. All assumptions. All of which _should_ be true.

When the nosetip of his mask touched the light, Zero threw out his arms, ready to embrace, not giving a care in the world if he looked crazy to the others watching him. He leaned himself forwards, and fell into the light.

It hurt.

 _Smack!_

He started to slide, and did not know— _bang!_

Zero hurt his head as he turned around to draw his claws on a surface that did not submit to them— _clang!_

The back of his head was engorging off of the instant pain from impact, and he continued to fall, and this time straight down.

Gravity was doing its work on the discombobulated jackal, and then...he just hung there, dazed.

It held him in its brightness, yet everything had felt cold when he slipped around inside it. He used his nose to help indicate his bearings...seemed to have forgotten he could only smell the metal wrapped around his face.

His vision fared poorly to how bright everything was around him. What he couldn't see belittled his regained confidence in oneself.

Zero became afraid, probably even moreso than with his encounter with those eyes as the feeling nearly overwhelmed him. His eyes darted around, body stuck in absent gravity as he huddled into himself, just absolutely out of his element again.

Whatever it was he was wedged inside of, he sensed a billowing of strange energy, hearing it surge through everything and everywhere as one, heaving unit. Whatever it was, it was stirring around him at a steady slow pace, mellowing his mind from the anxiety and injuries it was at war with. The scarred jackal was left to wonder if whatever was happening should linger on, or be done with.

Where did Eggman lead him to? Limbo?

The realm that finicked its fingers between good and bad, unsure of its decision? All his life, he always questioned if he was truly to be the beacon of fortune, or the caller to misfortune?

Here, he floated in white, rose-tinted through his eyes, left to think. It was actually quite peaceful. Maybe the Eggman had him go here to mentally—

Stab.

 **Stabbing.**

They stabbed him. Thin sticks of pain stabbed their way through his body, provoking a small yelp while they trapped him in place, unwavering as they effortlessly spun around and through him.

His eyes nearly rolled to the back of his head as the bright light impossibly grew around him, the strange puppet strings kneading themselves into every single one of his senses, and he could not...think.

The initial shock grew wary, and he was able to cogitate again, a sliver.

 _Everything_ _ **literately**_ _ **hurt**_. Every single instance he tried to contemplate, it felt like his mind was ready to snap for however weak it was at this point. He was mentally blinded by flashing images that sought to retell the harsh moments of when he was pushed around and beaten by the bullies, the huge jackal, and The Shadow. It was even arguing whether his eyes should stay open or closed; not even crying was soothing! Every single tear that squicked out of his eyeballs, gently brushing the tendrils of fur on his muzzle made as though the follicles were on fire, it seemed! The droplets laid in the space of his mask, reflecting bits and pieces of the one who blindly drew himself into the light. The pain was just so indescribable, and he barely made up his mind that he could not fathom that he'd be able to live through it. He wondered if this was what it felt like if you wished death upon yourself for days and weeks. And yet, through this bold torture, he no longer saw pink-hued white. He saw everything in **Crimson**.

This was what all he saw.

His eyelids were so painful to move, as though they were forbidden to wince from the torment.

The dreadlocks were aggravating the nerves perched on the back of his head while they wiggled.

His eyes fluctuated between the juxtaposed aches they were surrounded by.

For...how... _long...?_

And no matter if he stayed perfectly still, or twitched a single muscle, it was always total discomfort accompanying him.

If one were to watch this ongoing torture, they wouldn't notice the agony of unspeakable length that tampered his bruised face, torso and hand.

This went on and on, remorselessly.

The misery had been none the wiser to reintroduce the concept of numbness, and instead obligated to keep itself as the jackal's only company.

Forever.

...

...

...

Wait...

Has it been...an _**eternity...?**_

He tried to scream that thought aloud, but nothing ever came of it. Either way...

...He did not know.

And it...

 _Kept..._

 _ **Going...**_

 _ **Indefinitely...**_

Strangely, during this period, his mind established a zen-level plane, somehow at peace with the pain that constantly shot its way through his entire being, like a painful massage that meant to ensure every single moment was remembered by its receiver. Like...it made amends to the madness that was at hand. But what was the cause for this odd relationship? Through every, jagged piece of mental information he wrote in his head, he thought that maybe it was the color that was the intermediary to this. The color who simply did not leave him, only inked into the sole eye that wasn't shy of sight. The color, Crimson, that has—and always will—comfort him so tenderly.

And then, he experienced a sudden whirlwind of invigoration flowing through his entirety. He choked a silent breath as his body was twisted in a way that he was unable to witness what was going on with it. There was this tingling sensation sprouted from the pain spread on him, and all of it began to migrate towards his chest, and in response his eyes closed shut from the instant sensation—during this weird process, he felt it scrubbing his spirit of its depression and aches alike, making the pains of unknown pins and needles explode from his ill-being as he saw beneath closed eyes the flames again! Its formless self embraced him with a reuniting hug that made him feel warm. This was not torture just cause, no. This was supposed to get him acquainted with the cackling one's painful licks. Whatever this was, it must have _had_ to have been made by the Doctor.

 _Eggman_ —the master of memories, the respawner of dreams; he did it. He let him hold the fire!

But by this point, he wasn't the same. The tumultuous journey in oblivion led him to be something else entirely. And never will he forget this time.

He shuddered from being brought out of the constant adversity, huddling into himself like he did went he entered here. This was rather refreshing, as though he'd been reborn as the light dialed down its luminosity from his vision. A deep breath lunged into his chest. He gently guided it back out, absolutely satisfied to be awakened from his lucid slumber. His gold iris lowered harmlessly to the gloved fingers, which flexed with every controllable wiggle, without pain of any sort. It felt incredibly weird for him to be reintroduced to a body completely lacking of wracked nerves. He kind of missed its presence, actually.

Then his gaze traveled further down along his body, and parted his feet slightly to see the ridges of his hi-tops, which lazed in prominent waves of Crimson, the only source of light lit right now, the lot of it actually present throughout his whole body.

Next, his attention was put on the newest center of attraction—a peculiar gem, protruding out of his chest a slight. His stare almost hypnotically trailed along a bit of the swirling pattern encrested within its shape. The indefinite power that lived inside its rubic home ballooned and contracted itself within him, sailing him through much-needed comfort after what he went through. A claw was brought upon the jewel, brushing it gingerly along the surface, and as he did that he experienced more of the warmth inviting its effect the longer he kept a finger perched on it.

Then, he dropped his hand at his side. Carefully, he looked left and right. There was a family of hexagons idling in the air, bouncing the Crimson light which graced him.

The masked creature was satisfied to a degree to see where he truly was all this time.

He wasn't in limbo, that was for sure. All along, he was stuck inside a monster. A huge, metallic beast of which had no heart, because it was caring enough to give it to him. He sensed its heat still inside of it from the vast amounts of energy it pumped into itself to recapture his friend from the Moon.

And then he noticed something. He felt foolish to not have noticed it sooner—his feet hung over the bottomless pit of the metal beast's core, yet had not sunk into its immeasurable belly just yet.

He was levitating.

This was spectacular for the lone canine, who felt like a kid learning how to walk for the first time. He waddled his frame back and forth to test the airs, and was so enamored with it that his back tapped the flat surface of one of the jagged oblongs, reeling himself forth, ready for his back to taste pain—but it the pain wasn't there anymore, he realized.

Fervor was starting to make him feel giddy. He wanted to show his family what he gained, and apologize for how he treated them during the final moments of when he lived as a weakling!

But he looked around...the sleeping creature, dead from its sacrifice it made to him, left him with a cold shoulder or two.

Where were they? Where was his family? His senses reached out as he glowed a bit more, but couldn't feel anything. As he contemplated, he floated around like a lost guppy, wondering what had happened to them. Disappointment perched itself on his mind as he darted his head around.

Then he brought himself to face the silent machine again. The canine started to think that his mechanical caretaker just wanted him to sleep with it. It needed some rest after it did the last thing he ever thought was possible—melding the fire and himself together, even the Crimson. He was born anew, truly anew, and the mask only reinforced this notion further. But, as much as he appreciated this, he wished to see his fellow jackals again.

He was, technically, all alone.

At least he was warm in the reticence, idling in aerial suspension. He focused on his hands again.

His thumbs pursed their respective fingers, gently brushing each other as the jackal was in thought.

The creature was trying to get used to this feeling that constantly washed over him. It was like the fire was brushing him, grooming him after all the sufferings he endured throughout his life. He felt calm again.

Slowly, he descended onto the platform ring, and the piecemeal assortment of metal whispered traces of Crimson onto itself.

He was curious, and wanted to know what this place held.

One hi-top plodded after the other, each step's sound pattered and bumped across the many, shady surfaces it catered itself to as he approached a huge canister in front of him.

He saw an object nestled inside of it. The reborn oddity carefully pulled himself upwards to the air, and saw inside the tube a giant gem of sorts, much like the one he had. Was this the heart that donated its life to him? Carefully he pressed a hand on the glass, and the gem pulsed equivocal Crimson. And...was he starting to see that very same color on the other side of his mask?

The gem carried the maroon pattern on itself, and a beating glow that aligned itself with its smaller cousin; it felt so nice.

The powers of the jewels spiritually cradled each other as he felt his mind gradually lulled into a massage, and his whole body had felt warmer than normal, like he was bathed inside the middle of a furnace rather than cooked.

Closing his eyes made it even more pleasurable. He floated there for a moment, taking in all the pleasure of the two gems getting to know each other. He meditated, and rethought the err of his ways when he was his previous self.

Before, he did not have enough knowledge to back up his belief of being strong on his own, and that only small bursts of invigoration from the prayers given to the Moon were enough to fancy a bout with the dark omen. He also had been able to grasp the Crimson, and potentially control it, but had always been a bit unsure of himself.

Not so much now; now that the three of them were together, all existing admirably, distant and close friends now binded into one another, without complaint.

He wished to give back some of the power the larger gem gave him, and so he did. He experienced its glow expanding, the luminescence trembling past his soothed eyelids which were raised to watch the maroon object swindle with rekindled energy. The glow became so large that it caused the other canister opposite the side of the sleeping monster's belly to glow, and he noticed that it also carried a similar jewel.

There was another? He flew to it within a millisecond. He peered over to the side, back at the first one, astonished with how much speed he gotten now.

After the surprise had warn off, he placed a glove on this weaker gem, aiming to 'speak' with it, to make it swell with energy as much as its sister was giving out.

"You aren't weak, just dazed" he told it quietly. "I'll help you."

The sensation pressed him at ease with it. This moment of giving and taking was so strong that his mind was brought back to the time where he met his cackling friend on that fateful night.

He gasped with widened eyes, his mind in tune with hearing the dreadful, unstoppable drumbeat, but it never came. Why was he so worried? Everything was at peace here. The past was the past, after all.

He even noticed the right side of his mask's glow becoming a bit more pertinent this time.

Then it was done; the jewel was restored to its power, glowing so wonderfully.

Nothing else came of this, however. The two canisters were riveting in their resurrected power, but the both of them catered to arouse awareness to one final gem sleeping in their cocoon. He felt the winds cusp his fleeting body for a second before he had a hand perched on the final capsule, opening his eyes to see the last of the heartwarming jewels.

He repeated the process like he had done two times before.

"No need to tell me how you feel, I know you share the same troubles as your kin. I'll release you from the trouble" he spoke softly.

And life rang through it as well.

The whole right side of his mask was pulsating in Crimson.

His work helped gyrate restored power throughout the whole monster, as it rattled itself into life, the subtle humming of the machine slowly nuzzled his eardrums and made him appreciate his own efforts as the energy was restored to the wirings and huge generators that were in tune with the beast that brought him into this new life.

He gave the powered-up crystals one last stare and then began to look around, floating through the air to see if there was any way to get out without harming his caretaker. He gently brushed his palm on the cold wall, and only felt more of the energy stirring about, with the monotone heartbeat that hummed in the belly of the beast.

Then he curled around to the opposite end of the cylindrical chamber, placing his hand on that part of the wall as well. It was the same, again.

Where else was there to look, he pondered.

 _"Mmfrlrlrm..."_

What a weird sound. The muffling echoed throughout the vicinity of the room.

" _Wait a minute..._ What...?"

The distant voice carried itself, paired by the noise of what seemed to be fingers tapping on a keyboard. Then it stopped.

"... **Power...Power! Finally! Oh ho ho ho ho ho! I knew I hadn't gone through all this trouble for nothing! All sectors** — **resume activity! There are no breaks for Eggman's workers, unless otherwise!** "

That voice, shouting through those...speakers from above; it was the Eggman, the Doctor...the savior.

" **...This must be the work of the Phantom Ruby. I nearly thought this would all be for naught, simply stuck here dealing with the dark...** "

"The Shadow..." the jackal whispered. Was Eggman aware of Shadow the Hedgehog actually being the omen in disguise? If so, then at least the two of them agreed on something.

His gaze returned to the monster's core, wherein now laid the interesting twists of a helix, the couple-strands dancing around each other ad infinitum as the bright light shone upon them, as if they were the center of attraction, which they were as the abundance of metal hexagons flocked to them, reassuming their positions as guardians to the duo.

He gingerly lands on the circular platform surrounding this beauty, and sat on his knees.

"Thank you," he respectfully told them.

Time was going through the motions while the lone fellow was watching the helix dance.

He waited for the Doctor to hopefully give him some sort of passage to let him exit this place without trouble.

Then, his ear tuckered in the confines of the mask. He heard footsteps approaching him, and his ears felt these noises through the thickened layers of metal between themselves and the moving sounds.

Eventually, the sounds came to a complete stop, and Zero turned around and peered up to see twin doors opening up. His wish came true.

The masked creature zipped up with a low noise pouncing throughout the vast scape, with him seeing Eggman at eye level. He slowly brushed his sneakers back on the floor, looking up to the one and only person that knew he had an ounce of worth.

Eggman stood there with his arms behind his back, as usual.

"It's good to see my efforts weren't in vain."

The jackal bowed to his superior accordingly.

"Indeed," he responded. He liked how his deep voice was amplified by his rubic power.

He slowly rose his head up, and then tapped the jewel with a clawed finger.

"May I ask what you've given me—"

"—Power," Eggman said with an unreadable expression. "The Phantom Ruby possesses abilities amplifying your own _thousandfold_."

"Thousandfold..." the masked one reiterated.

The bulbous scientist leaned in, fingers brushing along a chin hidden inside his collar. "Now...do you wish to test your newfound strength?"

"Yes. Yes, Doctor" he pleaded, his hands enthusiastically placed on the Eggman's shoulders for a moment before latching them off, aware of his juvenile behavior.

Without a passing glance, the obese man turned around, facing the purple lights again.

"Follow me."

They went through the huge doors, and the two walked past a cluster of enlarged, hexagonal windows that gave the masked one a glimpse of where he was now. After walking underneath the overpass, they were met with a vast hallway, absent of a ceiling, where the jackal _really_ saw the amount of work put into this place. Weeks ago, the jackal who masqueraded as a leader thought of this architecture as disgusting, but as they walked down the tall passage, he took the time to really delve his stare into the intricate details partnering themselves to make one, huge, futuristic piece of architectural art, all crafted from the genius mind of the mustached man.

Littering his peripheral view was a giant network of several railed passageways, the ever-present humming of countless reactors and a great deal of Egg Pawns manning the whole place. Some were stationed by the various reactors, others signaled the go for shipment of what was assumed to be resources to build badniks. Patterns of stripped shadows through the segmented, metallic canyons gave more contrast to the hints of lights that were fastened into the walls' unified designs, which were comprised of accents of faux and pasty whites, complimented by glints of purple. There were a few, darkened spots that showed huge, motherboard designs evidenced by the clear-cut lines and circles, but these were steadily getting protected by the shelling established by the hard-working Pawns that served this place.

He turned his head to see the long walls that carried the strange buzzing noise that were felt by his sensitive eardrums—undoubtedly it came from the inside, where huge buzzsaws lurched along gigantic obstructions which surrounded the location of the metal bearer that gave him his gem; no doubt were traps for any trespassers.

He traveled his gaze up to the webs of red lasers, designed to piecemeal unsuspecting intruders at the top-most plateaus of the multi-faceted platforms, along with rows of metal supports zigzagging between the ravines of metal.

Not too long after sight-seeing the megaplex's defenses, a band of Egg Flappers flew across the partly-cloudy skies from above, which brought him to look at the lone tower that was a few hundred-stories tall, with it attracting pieces of rotating metal around itself as its veins glowed golden light. Near the middle of it were several bowl-shaped platforms, which seemingly floated in the air due to the state-of-the-art railings that connected them to the tower and outwards to the unseen edges of this place.

The grand piece of work was when the two encountered a gigantic statue of the man himself, with the organic counterpart stopping their walk to admire the view.

Sculpted in platinum, the larger Eggman duplicate stood confidently, one hand perched under the elbow of an arm, to which two fingers dabbled on his clean dome, which sparkled in the sunlight. The statue also had an angled, authoritative look which stood to be respected by followers and abhorred by opposers. He wondered what else could the Doctor do...!

The whole walk was silent, but the two appreciated it as such, and the jackal saw this as a sign of mutual respect.

After a while, Eggman pointed a finger to redirect his henchman, and the two cut around towards a branch in the stream of passages, and during their trek were several Egg Pawns walking in the opposite direction. They all saluted to the doctor that nodded at them before they continued on.

The two of them trailed along the decline of the metal path which angled downwards, following through into another hallway.

Finally, they stopped by a door that was a little bit taller than the jackal's height.

On the wall next to it, Eggman plopped his palm against a handprint recognition device, which beeped a cheerful tone before the door opened.

"Step inside," he offered a hand towards the direction of the darkened hallway.

The jackal gulped to see hints of chrome reflected from the outside's illuminating forces, but he pushed himself forward, aware of the flames he now carried.

He noticed that with every step, a ceiling light shotgunned its rays over him, which he appreciated as he kept a hand against the hallway while he proceeded.

Eggman tapped a button, and where he stood, he felt the platform shift a little before it protruded upwards a couple stories, stopping itself as it lined itself perfectly with the railings as he strode forward.

The canine finally came to terms with a large room, several dim lights pinholed rays downward, only showing bits of rotund objects that slept in the middle of it.

He surmised that this had to be a stadium of some kind before a screen turned on, with the doctor's mug splayed across it.

"This is the arena," Eggman said through the speakers, with every booming syllable accompanied by the lights steadily brightening to a visible level.

The masked being saw the complete scope of the huge room, which undermined the size of the gym the Eggman built for him and the jackals. Here, he saw the trademark color scheme Eggman usually loved to put into his architectural work, with hues of scarlet and gold luxuriously fashioned through the chrome, hexagonal paneling placed on the walls, and the gathering of circular shapes that made up the floor.

Along the cold surface laid an abundance of nonalert metal, adorned in white and accented black, resting til their time of mechanical purpose would be initiated by the gleaming face projected on the wall a few yards above them.

"This should be simple; I do not want a clean show. The both of us need to see what you are capable of. As much as I hate to see my own badniks get torn apart, take hold of this opportunity and wring out your power on these machines as much as possible!"

The canine acknowledged his superior's word.

"Test Squadron One!" the scientist barked.

The pale Pawns arose, their swirly-lensed, optic sensors clicked into luminance, manning their weaponry.

"Position..."

The small army did as they were told.

"...Attack!"

Their masked foe flew himself into the centermost of the oncoming swarm, and within seconds the troop was leveled into shrapnel as the chain reaction of explosions rang into every single one of their circuits, and they bursted into charred extremities. Behind the piling heap, there stood the jackal, who stared up into the navy lenses of his savior.

"...Those were the easy ones. Preparing the second round."

The canine was back on the middle of the arena floor within the blink of an eye.

"Test Squadron Two!"

The hull of metal in the wall rumbled in front of him, and the mouth opened up as a new swarm approached him, with variety this time.

Like last time, these badniks shared the same color scheme as the first batch, but these resembled shapes of animals. Some were the familiar Buzzers, Motobugs, and Crabmeats, while others such as the Crawltons, Ball Hogs, Coconuts, Slicers and Orbinauts were new to him as they approached him with a shared glare towards their single target.

"Position..."

They stopped, the only sound running through their audio detectors was the buzzing of the metal bees' wings.

"...Attack!"

The ones armed with blasters fired altogether, and the swarm of golden, energy balls flocked to him.

The jackal drew out one hand and hunched his fingers together, bundling the meddlesome group into one heap and the energy blasts into one fusion of contained energy with the other hand. He threw the former orb outwards before he sent the fused ball right into their direction, and the collision splurged an explosion that threw a majority of the useless pieces into the wall behind them.

"Hmph," the Eggman muttered.

After four more consecutive wins, the floor around the lone jackal was a light layer of scrap upon junk. He noticed the aroma of smoldering hardware and leaking oil as he patiently waited for what the Doctor had to say.

"You've made it this far. Of course by this point, you expect me to be impressed. I am, but not entirely. There's only one, final round you have to pass.

"Test Squadron Seven."

The metal side-walls were lifted up. Slowly, two figures emerged from either ends of the arena. The cyclops-behemoths approached him with staunch walks, powerful pistons carrying themselves across the sea of litter as they stretched and rotated their appendages during their checkup routine.

The canine darted his gaze left and right, with a firm stance that was albeit, a little apathetic.

"Position..."

They waited for the call...

"...Attack!"

Suddenly, two laser beams came from their heads, right before they were each stopped in their tracks by large hands comprised of scrap metal, who themselves were controlled by the masked figure, his hands' fingers were scrunched from the immense straining he had gathered as he looked back and forth. His palms were getting sweaty just as more trouble ensued—from his left was a plethora of thick wiring sprung out from the handplates, an _impossible_ amount of them en route towards the little target while the other swung out at least _six_ maces from its hands even though the badnik looked like it only carried two, each one ludicrously bigger than the previous.

The mob of metal spikes collided into each other, catching the poor jackal in the middle of it. The lasers were now penetrating the crowd of weaponry, giving it a heated glow to ensure termination of their target.

Inside, the jackal was in pain, _lots_ of pain. All of the chaos of writhing and seething through his fur, skin and organs. But he was used to it. And also, there was no blood.

The amount of ammunition either one had was too improbable—he quickly noticed this was a clever trick by Eggman. This was just too horrible to be driven by fear, and so the masked figure then held amusement in the outrageousness. An ounce of the pain began to die down.

Within the web of torture, he withstood their assault, mentally noting this as a pathetic example of physical maiming while his mind soon took control over what was true and what was fake; and all of which was the latter.

He began to rattle his body, which vibrated the objects off of him, and their illusionary values came to fruition once they began to incinerate into rubic, pixelated dust which began to hover over the sheet of junk.

Then he relaxed his fingers, causing the scrap-hands to give in and get crushed by the badniks' huge feet. It wasn't long before he outstretched both of his palms, having the giant mechs' weight traveling into each palm within several yards of each other before he crashed his hands together, the motion synchronized the curved turns of either mech as they were led to be slammed into each other. Their arms blipped and glitched scarlet as the impact further sped up the disintegrating process on their false appendages.

Still in the heat of the moment, the jackal started to conjure something inside his mind. He experienced the burning sensation grinding in between the edges of either palm, and something grew in between himself and the handicapped mechs.

A small fireball, increasing in size to become a miniature star, was condensed and withering endlessly in blazing heat. It wasn't very huge—but it was just enough. He launched it forth.

They were smoldered by the incoming inferno as its hot energy dissipated from the defeated pair. Heavy parts collapsed loudly against the floor, littering the garden of overthrown metal with sparks, laying within the bed of red, gleaming mist which never skipped a beat in its languid movement throughout the violent course.

Surprisingly, a great deal of their torsos remained intact, despite heavy cauterization of them.

He simply stared at them, the weaklings they were. He bent his fingers toward his palms, making the domed chromes buckle and whine as the metal was pulled and vacuumed into themselves.

 _DrDr DrnDrn_ _ **DrnDrn DrnDrn...**_

The noise of fretting metals reminded him of that drumming noise. It did not push him back, only forward as it was pounding in his mind, ushering him to go and prolong their torture for as long as he wanted. He wanted to crush them into the littlest denominator, until they were banished from existence. With that in mind, he carefully and slowly dug his fingers into his palms, and the sole eye shown through his mask was only a tease of the demented smile that instinctively sat upon his face. In fact, he was actually drooling in incitement of how good it felt melding these weaklings to his every whim—

"That's enough!"

The speakered voice beckoned him to reality, and he obeyed the Eggman's words; the rattling stopped. He stared up at the screen of the Doctor, the one who helped him be born anew.

"Magnificent display of powers, Zero. Perhaps, I should give you a new name..."

Yes, this Doctor, his savior, was very much in tune with his current thoughts.

No longer was he nothing.

He was anything.

"Aha! I have the ideal name for you, one you definitely deserve." he announced to his loyal lackey.

The masked figure's smile was hidden, but his bliss wasn't. He knew whatever he would be called by the Doctor would be perfect.

* * *

 **Sorry that it's so long. Rlly wanted to delve into Inf's psyche and how he became who he is now. Imagine how long it took re-reading this ch. and fine-tuning it...lol  
**

 **Trivia: These are two pieces I heard while making the first half:**

 **/watch?v=PLdzvzbEBBk**

 **/watch?v=LIuy81GiLl0**


	10. EPILOGUE

'Infinite' is now his name to claim.

It is an impeccable calling. It embodies who he became, and the undying influence of the Phantom Ruby fused with him. It has already been several days since it assimilated itself with his mind and body from prolonged bonding, fueling him with incomprehensible clout, like a nonexistent core kept underneath tiers of wild crimson that only one with a broken soul like his could control. Just thinking about this makes his body engulfed in crimson endlessly undulating all over him.

His empowering aura causes the obese Egg Pawns to scatter away from him as he lazily floats in the air like a limp doll, his bundle of dreadlocks swaying almost soundlessly, clinging onto the masked head.

He wants to train himself further, aiming to reach heights of power he never thought possible.

Suddenly, the corridor is awashed in a tone of discrete red. Infinite could never get enough of that color.

"Alert! Alert! Intruder detected on sector Mid-25-A. Repeat: Intruder detected on sector Mid-25-A" Orbot announces through the speakers.

"You heard the drill, Pawns! Foster your comrades down there and terminate the enemy accordingly!" Eggman redundantly commands afterward.

The Egg Pawns did not heed his command however, only creeping away from the masked figure as he glows persistently, playing with a ball of energy in the clutches of his sharpened claws, letting it dilate and abbreviate with every movement of his flowing fingers, with him aptly wondering how many ways he will take down this pest.

Would it be The Shadow? Infinite's claws start to tear into the power as he thought about it. It's still out there, and he knows it. He knows enough to know that the omen would be mischievous enough to tear down what his Savior built. The jackal could not help but lust for its return, to wrought despair upon it once again, and this time much worse than it had done on him.

Or could it simply be the Sapphire Wind that the Eggman is so fond of hating that even the canine himself shares to a smaller degree? He would not mind defeating him, either. It would simply make the air a lot less irksome, definitely. The only issue was that it wouldn't be the same as defeating the dark omen that constantly plagued his dreams and made him miserable.

He almost decided to explode the whole hallway with heated power, with the resentment urging him. But the bright fire in his hand tells him to keep calm, never to worry. It's finally with him—inside him. The masked being feels the warmth massaging every vessel in his body, also soothing his mind. It tells him a message that there is nothing to keel him, that it will help him live this new life prosperously.

 **You are the strongest** , it says.

He nods. Infinite can never deny that in present time, he will never be weak ever again. Only fathom it.

* * *

 **If you made it this far, I feel proud that this story was worthwhile for u.**

 **Technically my first ever villain story. I'm keeping the og version up for history. I won't be that guy and delete it...**

 **Thank Sega for this existing. I wouldn't have done this if Inf's story wasn't handled like that in Forces.**

 **A Sonic Forces adaption is in the works, but it's gonna be a somewhat-loose adaptation. Dunno when it'll be out, tho (might post it up chapter-by-chapter)...**

 **And the moral of the story is: Don't build a Boeing in 2 months...otherwise u get One Homonym.**

 **Keep your reviews 100! Don't be fake. Tell me what u like & don't like. There ain't gonna be new versions of this story, but I can use ur criticisms to better myself in the future.**


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